Music

These versatile and prolific artists perform an evening of solo sets showcasing songs from their widely acclaimed recordings on Nonesuch. Devendra Banhart opens with his intimate and surprising repertoire, including songs from his recent work, Mala; Stephin Merritt follows up with music from his rich catalog, and Iron and Wine closes the night with tracks from his Nonesuch debut album, Ghost on Ghost.

The Houston-born, Venezuela-raised, New York City-based singer-songwriter Devendra Banhart has embraced an astonishingly wide range of musical ideas, from folk to blues to the avant garde. Called “one of the more talented and charismatic forces in modern music” by Pitchfork, Banhart has collaborated with Antony and the Johnsons, Beck, Vashti Bunyan, Os Mutantes, Swans, and Vetiver. He has also performed with Gilberto Gil and Caetano Veloso and was part of a David Byrne–curated concert at Carnegie Hall. His eighth studio album, Mala—which was released last year, marking his Nonesuch debut—is named after the Serbian word for “small,” a colloquial term of endearment and an apt title for an album that is intimate in scale and open of heart.

Stephin Merritt and his many projects—the Magnetic Fields, the 6ths, the Gothic Archies, and Future Bible Heroes—have earned him recognition as one of the country’s best songwriters. Time Out New York has called him the “Cole Porter of his generation” and Spin and Rolling Stone, along with dozens of national magazines and newspapers, have hailed the Magnetic Fields’ 1999 album 69 Love Songs as one of the top albums of the year. Merritt previously performed at BAM with the Magnetic Fields in 2010 and as part of Next Wave of Song in 2002.

Singer-songwriter Sam Beam, under the stage name Iron and Wine, released his fifth record, Ghost on Ghost, in 2013, his debut on Nonesuch Records. Iron and Wine’s 2001 album, Kiss Each Other Clean, debuted at #2 on the Billboard chart to critical acclaim. Rolling Stone said of the album: “pop music hadn’t seen anything like it since the heyday of Cat Stevens.”