When Justin Vernon of Bon Iver and Aaron and Bryce Dessner from The National launched their 37d03d project a few years ago (pronounced "people", but upside down), they envisioned it as a collective of artists "freely creating and sharing our work with each other and everyone." And out of one of the 37d03d residencies, Bonny Light Horseman was born, a collaboration of musicians Anaïs Mitchell (whose Broadway hit Hadestown won in eight categories at the 2019 Tony Awards), Eric D. Johnson (better known to us as Fruit Bats), and Josh Kaufman (a multi-instrumentalist who has toured with Craig Finn, Josh Ritter, The National, to name a few). “The record captures the spirit of community and open collaboration that 37d03d was started to foster,” Aaron Dessner said via a press release.
In fact, the band explain that today's Song of the Day began as "a Fruit Bats sketch, until Kaufman recognized its uncanny (and unplanned) similarity to a traditional tune by that name (it shares some lyrics with ‘Waly Waly’ / ‘The Water Is Wide’). What you hear is the first and only take of the song, recorded in the wee hours of a midwinter’s night at Dreamland Studio in Woodstock, NY.”
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