Last week my Music Theory teacher Lore played us a music video called “Little Blue”, sung by Jacob Collier.  I’d never heard of him.  And that’s my loss … up until now.

I applauded at the end.  So did a few others in the class.  He was remarkable.

What is singing? 

A beautiful voice?  Sometimes.

A beautiful melody?  Hopefully.

Touching lyrics?  Yes.

But please … I need more.  I need the singer to have passion in their voice.  I need them to fill the room with their human story.  And I need “us”.

Therefore Jacob Collier.  At the piano, caressing the keys.  A flourish of the fingers.  Then standing before thousands in Lisbon, conducting their tones with a raising or lowering of the arms.

Voices together

Raised in song

It was an immense choir, filling the hall with yearning, as “Somebody to Love” unfolded.

Here’s the video.  Let it wash over you.   Let it touch our shared humanity.  Singing as plural.

*When you click on the link, you should see an option at the top of the page: “Song/Video”.  Definitely choose video.  There is much to see.

**Arghh.  After I published this post, I opened the link and there was no video option.  I suggest that you download YouTube Music from Google Play (or the other one) and find Jacob singing “Somebody to Love” in the “Video” section.  That should work.  You need to see this.

https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=nYyRfbHMU60&si=lhn6fiEro2aesGTz