Sep 22, 2026 · 44 min
A week in songs moves from Bach restraint to shoegaze release
Lizzy McAlpine, Víkingur Ólafsson plays Bach, and more of the week's best songs
The episode shows how contemporary music can turn grief, tradition, folklore, and noise into distinct forms of emotional expression.
- 1Víkingur Ólafsson’s restrained Bach arrangement makes familiarity feel newly intimate and spacious.
- 2Lizzy McAlpine’s writing confronts grief, family memory, regret, and the wish to remain heard after death.
- 3The selections widen from Beth Taylor’s folkloric vocal power to Untitled Halo’s cathartic shoegaze and Inti Figgis-Vizueta’s string quartet music.
Don't miss
Víkingur Ólafsson’s restrained arrangement of Bach’s “Air and the G String” makes a familiar work feel unusually intimate.
The brief
The episode opens with Sen Morimoto’s “Chewing Gum,” whose off-kilter production and invitation to slow down establish a playlist attentive to how songs reshape ordinary feeling.
Víkingur Ólafsson’s elegant arrangement of Bach’s “Air and the G String” turns a familiar melody toward restraint, space, and the pianist’s lifelong relationship with Bach.
Lizzy McAlpine’s “Older” becomes the emotional center: a song about a complicated father, regret, memory, and the desire to be heard after death.
The selections then move through Beth Taylor’s dark folkloric voice, Untitled Halo’s shoegaze catharsis, and Inti Figgis-Vizueta’s contemporary music for string quartet.
Taken together, the choices argue for breadth without flattening differences: grief, sea-themed repertoire, noisy release, and transition each receive their own musical language.