{"id":762,"date":"2026-06-29T16:07:45","date_gmt":"2026-06-29T16:07:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cityrelocationnews.com\/?p=762"},"modified":"2026-06-29T16:07:45","modified_gmt":"2026-06-29T16:07:45","slug":"the-natural-memory-of-kabir-sehgal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cityrelocationnews.com\/?p=762","title":{"rendered":"The Natural Memory of Kabir Sehgal"},"content":{"rendered":"
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If Spotify playlists have taught us anything, it\u2019s the utility of lo-fi beats. They\u2019re the perfect companion for studying, focussing, and chilling. But contemplating civics? Kabir Sehgal thinks so. Sehgal is a fourteen-time Grammy-winning producer and jazz musician, whose new album, \u201cStars and Static 2026,\u201d mixes noodly, restrained takes on patriotic staples with natural sounds recorded in American locales (\u201cyankee newport doodlin\u2019,\u201d \u201cthis is my little rock sunset\u201d). \u201cI call it \u2018geo-fi,\u2019\u00a0\u201d Sehgal said the other afternoon, at the East Coast Memorial, in Battery Park. \u201cWhen you name a place, there\u2019s a provenance. I wanted to see if lo-fi could be a place of natural memory, to have that conversation of what it means to be American.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more Bruce Nauman Isn\u2019t Bound by the Rules<\/a><\/p>\n

Sehgal, who is tall and younger-looking than his forty-one years, is less a multi-hyphenate than a vocational run-on\u2014not only a musician and producer but also a former finance executive who is a Navy reservist and an author of books about jazz and currency, and the co-author of celebrities\u2019 books (with John Lewis and Deepak Chopra) and children\u2019s picture books (with his mother, Surishtha). \u201cI call it a \u2018portfolio career,\u2019\u00a0\u201d he said. About a decade ago, he would frequent the East Coast Memorial while working at a finance firm. (He later worked at JPMorgan, in whose office he was sworn in to the military. Wynton Marsalis, a mentor, attended.) Sehgal, who wore a jacket and a quarter zip, took in the monument\u2019s massive granite pylons, inscribed with the names and ranks of the more than four thousand Americans who never returned from the Atlantic during the Second World War. Jackhammers carried on nearby.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n

\u201cThis would have been a great place to do a field recording,\u201d Sehgal said. \u201cWhat better way to say we\u2019re a work in progress?\u201d He gestured southward, noting that there would typically be a beautiful view of the Statue of Liberty. It was blocked by a construction wall, which extended toward a building labelled \u201cU.S. Department of Homeland Security.\u201d<\/p>\n

A few years ago, after a long series of musical collaborations, including several guided meditations with Lil Jon and a spoken-word album with the Dalai Lama, Sehgal found himself drawn to the D.I.Y. simplicity of lo-fi experimentation. At the same time, he\u2019d had his eye on America\u2019s Semiquincentennial, and had taken to using a two-pronged Sony field recorder to capture his sonic surroundings during his domestic travels. Pedalling through the South Carolina Lowcountry on his bike became percussion under \u201cBattle Hymn of the Republic.\u201d Chatter at a festival in Atlanta, his home town, formed interstices in \u201cAmerica the Beautiful.\u201d (There was one overseas inclusion: the bustle of Naples, where Sehgal was once stationed at a U.S. naval command, is layered into the Naval Academy fight song, \u201cAnchors Aweigh.\u201d) Sehgal stripped the familiar tunes of key elements, hoping that listeners would fill the negative space. \u201cThis entire project is melody by implication,\u201d he explained. He also slowed them considerably, to induce a meditative effect. \u201cThese aren\u2019t, like, brisk marches,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is less fireworks, more reflecting pools.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more Herding the Fro-Yo Sheep<\/a><\/p>\n

At the memorial, Sehgal walked past a swooping bronze eagle sculpted by the Italian-born medallist Albino Manca and dedicated by President John\u00a0F. Kennedy six months before his death. Gulls shrieked. Cuban music boomed from a speaker on a bench. \u201cIf you were to do a song of downtown New York, what is it?\u201d Sehgal asked. \u201cThe rhythm of the song would be clave.\u201d Perhaps, he suggested, it could be peppered with the solicitations of red-jacketed tourist-ferry barkers. \u201cYou don\u2019t have to do much more than that,\u201d he said. He strolled toward Bridge Street, where a stars-and-stripes cement mixer whirred and beeped. \u201cThose always remind me of \u2018Die Hard,\u2019\u00a0\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Two blocks later, he stopped in at Fraunces Tavern, the former revolutionary hub where a victorious George Washington bid farewell to his officers. Sehgal ordered an iced tea and took a barstool. Aside from indistinct public patter, only one voice is featured on his album: that of John Lewis, the late Georgia congressman. In 2017, Sehgal was part of a group that accompanied Lewis on a trip to Selma. \u201cWe were having breakfast in a hotel lobby, and I was, like, \u2018Do you think I can record you?\u2019\u00a0\u201d Sehgal said. He set up a wall of ballroom chairs to muffle the nearby kitchen noise and had Lewis read President Barack Obama\u2019s recent remarks at the Edmund Pettus Bridge. For the album, he laid the track over the chord progression of \u201cWe Shall Overcome.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sehgal sipped his drink. He said he hoped that people would not only \u201ccheck out the record but, like\u201d\u2014he mimed popping out earbuds\u2014\u201clisten to your surroundings. Wouldn\u2019t that be a lesson for democracy? Listen to people.\u201d\u00a0\u2666<\/p>\n

Read more Postscript: Mark Singer<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For his new album, \u201cStars and Static 2026,\u201d the fourteen-time Grammy winner recorded sounds from across the country. Did it change how he thinks about America? Dan Greene reports.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":761,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[104],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-762","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-semiquincentennial-dept"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Natural Memory of Kabir Sehgal - City Relocation News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/cityrelocationnews.com\/?p=762\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Natural Memory of Kabir Sehgal - City Relocation News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"For his new album, \u201cStars and Static 2026,\u201d the fourteen-time Grammy winner recorded sounds from across the country. 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