The Gig (Newsletter)

Tony Bennett performing on The Tonight Show sometime in the mid-to-late 1960s. (Raimondo Borea/Gartenberg Media Enterprises/Getty Images) As this post sails out into the world, I’m heading up to Fort Adams State Park for the Newport Jazz Festival. More on that in a future dispatch, but if you happen to see me there, please say hello. In the meantime, I want to talk about Tony Bennett. He was born a century ago this coming Monday, on August 3, 1926.

There’s always plenty to talk about with Makaya McCraven. The self-described Beat Scientist — a drummer / bandleader / composer / producer / collagist — keeps his gears perpetually turning, in a range of instrumental context and configurations. Next week, he’ll set up for his bandleading debut at The Village Vanguard, where he recently played his first gig ever, with ride-or-die compatriot Marquis Hill. This felt like a very good time to catch up with McCraven.

Steven Bernstein, at home in the stacks. (Andrew Blackstein) When you’re talking about Steven Bernstein — Sexmob ringleader, verified trickster, the guy who once titled a series of album bumpers “Human Bidet” (Parts 1 through 6) — you can’t come calling with a yawn for a hook.

The British pop polymath RAYE, in a promotional image. (Audemars Piguet) Illuminated by a moody spotlight at the Auditorium Stravinski, she started into a song with some richly layered history, against a backdrop of lightly strummed acoustic guitar, sparse electric piano, and a subtle slick of strings. The song was “Who Knows Where the Time Goes,” by the English folk-rock goddess Sandy Denny, who wrote it in 1966 and famously recorded it with Fairport Convention in ‘69.

Kris Davis, Robert Hurst and Johnathan Blake, whose new trio album, Lost in Geneva, will be released on Sept. 25. (Ssirus Pakzad) It seemed like everyone and their uncle released a mid-year album list in 2026. That’s cool, I recognize the hustle. I even contributed to one, at NPR Music. (I leaned into honest pleasures for both album and song picks: respectively, Kacey Musgraves and Tomeka Reid.

Clifford Brown, Birdland, NYC 1954. (Herman Leonard Photography LLC / National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution) A car bearing trumpeter Clifford Brown and pianist Richie Powell lost control on a rain-slicked stretch of the highway near the Bedford Interchange, 200 miles east of Philadelphia.

So, Gabriel Kahane and I did a thing. Earlier this week, we hoped on Substack Live — he from his music studio in Portland, Oregon, me from a home office just outside of Philly — for a talk we called Honest Songcraft in the Slop Era. It was, as we’d hoped, a far-ranging yet focused conversation about creative practice, productive friction, and the way we’re all making do at a moment of peak precarity. It was also, as I knew it would be, a lot of fun.

The Edward MacDowell Medal, awarded each summer at the MacDowell Colony in Peterborough, New Hampshire, honors artists of exceptional achievement across a range of disciplines. Its first recipient was Thornton Wilder, who worked on Our Town during one of his MacDowell residencies. Since then the medal has been bestowed on the likes of Edgard Varèse, Georgia O’Keeffe, Sonia Sanchez, and Jasper Johns.

A reunited Yeah No — Cuong Vu, Skúli Sverrisson, Chris Speed, Jim Black — at Solar Myth in Philadelphia, April 11, 2026. (The Gig) Chris Speed’s Yeah No sounded like nothing else when they first formed 30 years ago.

We bring you glad tidings of good conversation on Tuesday, June 16, as a composer and a critic find common ground on Substack Live. We’re calling this discussion “Honest Songcraft in the Slop Era,” with all due sincerity (and just a little cheek). The composer in question has a newsletter, Gabriel Kahane: Words & Music. The critic is yours truly, Nate Chinen, posting at The Gig. You’re reading this on one of our platforms, so I’ll assume you know who’s who.