Lots of people make live albums. Very few people, however, make live albums where they're accompanied by children's choirs. The veteran singer-songwriter Laura Veirs is one of the few. This fall, Veirs will follow 2023's Phone Orphans, her most recent studio album, with a new record called Laura Veirs And The Choir Who Couldn’t Say (Live In Angoulême). It's a live document of a recent concert where Veirs performed a career-spanning selection of her songs with a French school choir.
Earlier this year, Laura Veirs performed with a French school choir that includes 32 students -- 30 girls and two boys, all between the ages of 12 and 18. Choir director Patrice Cleyrat did the vocal arrangements, and he and the choir practiced for nine months before performing with Veirs. In concert, Veirs sang and played acoustic guitar, while Cleyrat played keyboard on some songs. No other musicians were involved. Together, Veirs and Cleyrat produced the resulting album, which has 14 Laura Veirs songs, as well as one from case/lang/veirs, her one-album supergroup with Neko Case and k.d. lang.
As lead single, Laura Veirs has shared the live version of "I Can See Your Tracks," a song from her 2010 album July Flame. Veirs sings on it, but it feels like she's really there to support the choir. In a press release, Veirs says, "Hearing their brave and soulful renditions of my songs and performing with them was a career highlight. I’m so glad we were able to capture the magic of this performance and can share it with the world in the form of this new album." Below, check out the video of them performing "I Can See Your Tracks," as well as the Laura Veirs And The Choir Who Couldn’t Say (Live In Angoulême) tracklist.
TRACKLIST:
01 "Intro"
02 "Shining Lamp Interlude 1"
03 "Freedom Feeling"
04 "Wide-Eyed, Legless"
05 "Shining Lamp Interlude 2"
06 "Little Deschutes"
07 "Lonely Angel Dust"
08 "I Want To Be Here"
09 "Shape Shifter"
10 "Shining Lamp Interlude 3"
11 "Black Butterfly"
12 "Snow Camping"
13 "Make Something Good"
14 "Riptide"
15 "I Can See Your Tracks"
Laura Veirs And The Choir Who Couldn’t Say (Live In Angoulême) is out 10/10 on Laura Veirs' own label Raven Marching Band Records. Pre-order it here.
