Our Daily Breather: M. Ward Recommends Listening To McCoy Tyner

Who: M. Ward

Where: Los Angeles, Calif.

Recommendation: Listening to McCoy Tyner

Has there ever, in the history of mankind, been a better time for staying home to read and write? And then when you need a break: maybe listen to music.

The great jazz pianist McCoy Tyner passed away last month — so here at home on headphones, I've been exploring his catalog. He played on my favorite record of all time, Ballads by John Coltrane. If you haven't heard it, I think this piano intro on "I Wish I Knew" is a good place to start.

I've been listening to a lot of music from Mr. Tyner's era and thinking about the new era that we are now (un)settling into and thinking: What will we have learned from this current crisis? My hope is that the new era will bring a new calibration between human and planet and animals. I hope it's obvious now that our future depends on it.

M. Ward's new record, Migration Stories, is out now.

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