FYI.

This story is over 5 years old.

Music

H.E.R Makes Her Tiny Desk Concert Look So Goddamn Easy

After being a guest on Daniel Caesar's Tiny Desk Concert, the elusive R&B singer finally has a chance to serenade us with her own 18-minute medley.
KC
Queens, US
H.E.R.
Screenshot of NPR's Tiny Desk Concert

H.E.R. is not quite a hidden secret anymore. Two years ago she was literally hiding behind the shadowy silhouette on her debut EP, H.E.R. and now the singer is nominated for five Grammys, including Album of the Year and Best New Artist. Today NPR shared a Tiny Desk concert with the singer, on which she stretched out four songs from her I Used to Know Her EPs: "Going," "Feel A Way," "Hard Place," and H.E.R's' "Focus." Though it's H.E.R.'s time in the sun, she cedes some of the spotlight to her backup singers whose energy she clearly feeds off of. In a relaxed and easygoing way, they offer up expansive playful harmonies and improvised adlibs as H.E.R floats over the top. "We can do this all day, but we don't have all day," she says behind a smile. Throughout the 18-minute performance, H.E.R. trades in an electric guitar for an acoustic one, until she ditches the acoustic for a keyboard. In June, she was a guest on Daniel Caesar's Tiny Desk Concert, and now she's proving that she's more than capable of holding her own. Watch the performance in full below.

Advertisement

Kristin Corry is a staff writer for Noisey. Follow her on Twitter.