Tiny desk concerts
Tiny Desk Concerts (short Tiny Desk ; english tiny desk ) is a podcast of the US - radio network NPR . The format, which has been in production since 2008, includes acoustic concerts by musicians of various styles, each recorded at the desk of radio host Bob Boilen ( All Songs Considered ) at the NPR headquarters in Washington, DC . The 15-minute long concert videos are very popular and often reach audiences in the millions.
history
Bob Boilen and NPR Editor Stephen Thompson attended a performance by Laura Gibson at the Austin South by Southwest music festival in 2008 . Because the concert took place in a small bar where people were watching live sports and chatting loudly, it was hardly possible for the two of them to listen to the musician with the delicate voice. Thompson then joked to Gibson that she should perform in his office. Three weeks later, the singer responded to the suggestion and appeared at the NPR Music office in Washington. Boilen and colleagues decided on his desk as the venue and recorded the spontaneous concert with microphones and a camera. The name Tiny Desk Concerts was based on Boilen's post-punk band from Tiny Desk Unit , whose name was based on an inside joke .
Since then, the concerts at the desk have been recorded at irregular intervals, often several times a week, and published days or weeks later on the NPR website and the official YouTube channel. The performing artists are selected by a number of editors who strive for a mixture of established musicians and largely unknown newcomers. For the 200th edition of the concert series, Laura Gibson performed a second time in March 2012. In the spring of 2013, the NPR headquarters moved within Washington, which also changed the location of the concerts. A gig outside the NPR building was first recorded in October 2016 when rapper Common performed at the White House library as part of South by South Lawn .
In the course of the COVID-19 pandemic , only home concerts (Tiny Desk Home Concerts) have been recorded from March 2020 until further notice .
production
All concerts have in common that they are recorded without a PA system , complex effects devices or unusual electronics, ie unplugged . As a rule, all the equipment, including instruments and microphones, has to be located behind the table top. A team of four is responsible for the recording. In order to capture the sound as directly as possible and without background noise, usually only an MS stereo pipe directional microphone from Sennheiser (MKH 418) is used. Very minor changes can be made after recording. For aesthetic reasons, the video is recorded with three to five handheld cameras, mainly Canon 5D Mark II , and ideally in one take , which also emphasizes the pauses between the songs. The audience usually consists of up to 300 NPR employees and contributes to the acoustic atmosphere, but is deliberately not captured by the film cameras. Special features of the recording location are the shelves in the background filled with records and CDs and the desk covered with office supplies and merchandising .
Performers
The Tiny Desk Concerts cover a broad spectrum of musical styles, from classical baroque music to jazz to contemporary hip-hop . Due to Bob Boilen's personal preference for obscure indie rock , this genre was particularly common in the early years. In addition to music legends such as Tom Jones , Randy Newman or Mavis Staples , promising young artists are also successful at the "Tiny Desk". Usually each musician only performs once, but exceptions are always made. In 2015 , the 23-strong Mucca Pazza ensemble made its “biggest” appearance to date .
In order to provide a stage for largely unnoticed musicians, the NPR launched a competition for one of the coveted concerts at the end of 2014. Boilen and a jury made up of employees and musicians evaluated more than 7,000 submitted videos and selected 47-year-old Fantastic Negrito as the first winner of the Tiny Desk Contest . In the following years, Dan Auerbach and Trey Anastasio were among the jury members. The previous contest winners were:
| year | winner |
|---|---|
| 2015 | Fantastic negrito |
| 2016 | Gaelynn Lea |
| 2017 | Tank and the Bangas |
| 2018 | Naia Izumi |
| 2019 | Quinn Christopherson |
reception
Since it was first broadcast, the podcast has become one of the most popular music series on the Internet. Due to the special genre mix and, above all, the authenticity of the individual appearances, the series now enjoys cult status . Ralf Dombrowski from Spiegel Online found the format to be more professionally prepared, both optically and acoustically, than the video podcast standard. Despite the virtual mediation, it is possible to make the artists look up close and as natural as possible. Co-inventor Bob Boilen said the specialty of the concert series is that it lets the musicians do something that they normally wouldn't do, that is, give them a challenge. In this way, artists could convince. The result is a "special intimacy " that makes it impossible to hide, and the format brings comparisons with the MTV Unplugged series . “Unplugged” inventor Robert Small described the Tiny Desk Concerts as a modern incarnation of his show and “antidote” to the digital era. Zachary Crockett from Vox summed up the 2016 concert series as follows:
“In an age of overproduction and digital manipulation, Tiny Desk offers us something honest: performances rife with awkward pauses, untuned guitars, and hiccups. It reassures us that our vulnerabilities are meant to be celebrated, not hidden (...) Confining an artist to a desk has a very real effect on the outcome of sound. Sets are incredibly intimate, up-close, and personal - sometimes almost painfully so (...) Stripped of typical stage equipment, musicians are forced to confront the essence of their art form. "
“In an age of overproduction and digital manipulation, Tiny Desk offers us something honest: gigs full of uncomfortable pauses, unpunctured guitars and hiccups. It encourages us that our vulnerabilities should be celebrated, not hidden (...) Moving an artist to a desk has a very real effect on the sound result. The sets are incredibly intimate, close and personal - sometimes almost painfully (...) Without the typical stage equipment, the musicians have to deal with the essence of their art form. "
Criticism was initially directed against Bob Boilen's lack of interest in genres such as classical , country and especially hip-hop . In cooperation with other NPR editors, however, these gaps were gradually filled and artists from many different musical genres were invited. The first appearance of a rapper, T-Pain , who had to do without the use of auto-tune - usually a characteristic of his music - attracted a lot of attention in October 2014 .
According to an evaluation published by Forbes Magazine , which took into account the number of views of YouTube videos and Wikipedia articles, artists achieve greater awareness on average with a Tiny Desk Concert than with appearing on a late-night show . The number of clicks on the video platform is in the millions, the ten most popular videos were viewed more than 220 million times.
Most watched concerts on YouTube (as of August 1, 2020)
| # | No. | publication | Interpreter | Calls |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 557 | 22nd August 2016 | Anderson .Paak & The Free Nationals | 53.2 million |
| 2 | 773 | August 8, 2018 | Mac Miller | 40.7 million |
| 3 | 112 | February 14, 2011 | Adele | 19.2 million |
| 4th | 399 | October 29, 2014 | T-Pain | 18.9 million |
| 5 | 753 | June 14, 2018 | Jorja Smith | 18.8 million |
| 6th | 682 | December 11, 2017 | Tyler, the Creator | 16.4 million |
| 7th | 474 | October 2nd, 2015 | Lianne La Havas | 15.1 million |
| 8th | 865 | July 10, 2019 | Sting & Shaggy | 13.8 million |
| 9 | 663 | 3rd November 2017 | Natalia Lafourcade | 13.6 million |
| 10 | 609 | April 14, 2017 | Tash Sultana | 13.6 million |
- ↑ The YouTube publication usually takes place a few weeks after the recording.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d Zachary Crockett: Tiny Desk: how NPR's intimate concert series earned a cult following. Vox , November 21, 2016, accessed August 31, 2019 .
- ↑ Bob Boilen : Tiny Desk - OK Go. NPR , June 3, 2013, accessed August 31, 2019 .
- ↑ Bob Boilen : Tiny Desk - Common. NPR , October 4, 2016, accessed August 31, 2019 .
- ↑ Josh Rogosin: How We Record Audio At The Tiny Desk. NPR Music / YouTube , January 30, 2017, accessed August 31, 2019 .
- ↑ a b Ralf Dombrowski : Adele comes into the office and sings. Spiegel Online , December 11, 2015, accessed on August 31, 2019 .
- ↑ Tyler Falk: 'Soul is just right there' for the winner of NPR's Tiny Desk contest. Current, February 17, 2015, accessed August 31, 2019 .
- ↑ Chris Riemenschneider: Duluth singer / fiddler Gaelynn Lea wins NPR's Tiny Desk Contest. Star Tribune , March 3, 2016, accessed August 31, 2019 .
- ↑ Melinda Daffin: Tank and the Bangas beat out 6,000 to win NPR's Tiny Desk Contest. NOLA.com, February 18, 2017, accessed August 31, 2019 .
- ↑ Rob Harvilla: how NPR's Tiny Desk Concerts Took Over the Internet. The Ringer, August 15, 2017, accessed August 31, 2019 .
- ↑ Marcus J. Moore: How 'All Songs Considered's' Bob Boilen went from Tiny Desk to tastemaker. The Washington Post , April 14, 2016, accessed August 31, 2019 .
- ↑ Emily Blake: NPR's Tiny Desk Concert: As Powerful For Musicians As Late Night? Forbes , July 20, 2017, accessed August 31, 2019 .
- ↑ NPR Music - Most Popular Videos. NPR / YouTube , accessed March 5, 2020 .