312: Kurt Elling Returns

Kurt Elling returns for a wide-ranging conversation about vocation, gratitude, and what it means to be in service of the music.

Elling first appeared on The Third Story nearly ten years ago, already one of the most celebrated singers of his generation and still deeply focused on what he calls "the work I haven't done yet." Since then, he has moved from New York back to his native Chicago, launched major projects like SuperBlue with Charlie Hunter and members of Butcher Brown, recorded intimate small-group albums in the Wildflowers series of recordings, started his Big Shoulders record label, and continued his "poetic practice" of adding new lyrics to instrumental works by artists such as Wayne Shorter and Jaco Pastorius.

The immediate occasion for this reunion, however, is something entirely new: Elling is currently appearing on Broadway in Hadestown, playing the role of Hermes.

Recorded in an apartment on the Upper West Side during his Broadway run, the conversation moves fluidly between jazz clubs and civic life. Elling speaks candidly about depression, aging, discipline, politics, and the moral responsibility of artists in unsettled times. Throughout, he returns to a central idea: the artist's job is not ego or display, but manifestation — to channel the song so something healing can happen in the room.

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