Phil Cook’s life is filled with musical collaborations. With his brother Brad in Megafaun, his lifelong friend Justin Vernon in Bon Iver and DeYarmond Edison, and with MC Taylor in Hiss Golden Messenger.
He’s also worked with the Blind Boys of Alabama and Shirlette Ammons, and that’s just scratching the surface.
For his new recording “Appalachia Borealis,” he settled down with his first love: the piano.
This interview has been lightly edited for clarity and brevity. You can hear the full interview by clicking the LISTEN button at the top of this post.
“Appalachia Borealis” opens with “Rise” which is just gorgeous. It doesn’t take long to get to a passage that reminds me of gospel music, which I know is near and dear to your heart. Do you want to talk about the emotional place you were coming out of when you made this record?
The first piano record I put out was called “All These Years.” I put it out in ’21. The process of making that record was the inner struggle of reinvention and really having to reintroduce myself to the public as the person I actually was all along and making really vulnerable music. So, releasing that out into the world felt like a bit of a trust fall.
But the process of doing it was so affirming for me, man. My internal feedback loop was so fulfilled and true. And I knew I was on the right path because, as Alice Gerrard said, “Follow the music.” Just always follow the music where it goes, right? And sitting down to write this next record, I was in the middle of going through a family breakup and divorce and navigating all that whole world.
There’s a lot of reintroducing yourself to yourself in that kind of a landscape. Everyone has to figure out where how to move on and pick up. You have to kind of scrounge around for the pieces that you know and hold on to them, so you can stand on. Those are hard to find, but I feel so blessed that the piano is there again for me, sitting there.
It’s been the language I’ve had since I was a little boy. I was a sensitive kid. You know, my mouth was open a lot and I often had to be retrieved from being preoccupied in thought, in processing everything always happening. So, when I found the piano, it was like a language that I understood and I wrote it on my own terms.
And to return to that has just been quintessential in this like reinvention and rediscovery of so much of what I love about music. You can hear that on the record. I mean, the microphones are all live. They’re right with me. You can hear me breathing, while I’m playing, you can hear me rocking in the chair. I’ve always rocked back and forth whenever I play piano. My childhood teachers were so, so adamant that I stop it and I just couldn’t. They were just like, you move so much when you play, it’s distracting. I’ve tried, but this is what I do.
“Two Hands In My Pocket” — did that stretch your personal technique a bit?
I think that like part of the last few years of rededicating myself to piano is just getting back into like the technique and practicing every day and getting the balance set down. And there are moments, those moments we just have like, oh the sun’s shining just right, and the weather’s just hitting right and you just, you walk out the door and you’re kind of like, I don’t know why, but I’m feeling it today.
And you just got to hold those moments, because you know they don’t last. They’re going to be, they’re going to be just a part of the whole parcel of everything you’re going to experience. And so, I wanted the record to really reflect all the spirits of things that are happening.
That song just felt like a joyous, I don’t know — it was just a sweet surrender into a moment that just felt like that kind of a day.
What made you decide to do a solo piano version of the Gillian Welch song “I Made A Lover’s Prayer”?
That was a day, it was a really special day. Believe it or not, I’m 45, but I haven’t owned my own piano until two years ago.
I remember the day I got home from tour, and I went to Mouse Piano in Raleigh, and I played all the pianos in the shop. I had like 500 bucks in my pocket for a Craigslist piano. The last piano I played was a Yamaha U3 1976, and it was just like, uh-oh. And I saw the price tag, and then the owner was so sweet. He was like, hey man, we got this program. If you can put 500 bucks on — like, I literally have 500 bucks in my pocket right now. That’s what I got. And he’s like, comes with a free tuning.
And so like a week later, my first like real piano arrived at my studio. And that day I just sat there, I had some emotion, of course. I was like, dang, it took me a long time to really give myself this. And the first thing I did when I sat down, that’s the first thing that came out.
I just had been listening. That song has just been with me for so long. And it means a lot to a lot of people. I know, my friend Frazey (Ford) covers it at her shows and it’s like a deep song for us. And so, I sent it out as more of a voice memo, love letter to them, just like, hey, I got my first piano today. Love you guys. And I sent it out to like two or three people. And then I was like, I really should actually work on that arrangement.
The sound of “Reliever” for me allows a quiet moment of reflection. It’s like the release of a deep breath and we can hear your breath and we can hear the way you approach the keys with your fingers in this song. When you play a piece like that, can you imagine five years from now what it would be like?
That’s a good question. I want to say that that song is very deep. That was one where I had tears streaming down my cheeks while I was performing that on the recording. I knew while it was happening that I was in that zone, in that space, that sacred place. I think having a song like that or a moment that always invites me whenever I sit at the piano to perform it or anything, it’s just, that’s a little window that I have coming up that I just know it’s reserved for me in that emotional space I was in.
So, whatever happens with that song in the future, it will always be this invitation for me to participate with my soul and really speak with my body, in a way. I’m looking forward to whatever happens to that.
Phil Cook will be performing at the Pinhook in Durham Sunday, March 23. The show will also feature a companion film followed by a live Q&A.
