Jonathan Michael Batiste is an American musician, songwriter, record producer, bandleader, television personality and actor. He has recorded and performed with artists including Alicia Keys, Stevie Wonder, Prince, Willie Nelson, Doja Cat, Lenny Kravitz, ASAP Rocky, Ed Sheeran, Lana Del Rey, Roy Hargrove, Juvenile, Mavis Staples, and Lauryn Hill. Batiste appeared nightly with his band, Stay Human, as bandleader and musical director on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert from 2015 to 2022.
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"Beyoncé's Homecoming performance, this box set, feels like a historic item just because for me, I love that performance because it blended together a lot of the traditions of different styles of music in a way that was very much a synthesis of all those things showing the connections between them."Watch this moment
"D'Angelo engineered by Bob Power and the sound of this record, I remember when I heard it, it was on BET, and it was 'Brown Sugar' was actually the video that I saw. The sound of the organ and the drums was the first time that I heard something blend this sort of Soul Jazz hip hop synthesis of music."Watch this moment
"I just love this band. I love the mystery of this band. I love the collective vibration of this band, how it seems like such a pure intention behind the music community."Watch this moment
"When it came out, I remember my lady and I, we listened to this from top to bottom and it was one of those experiences of listening to an album that sticks, which you remember where you were, what you were doing, how you felt and the influence of it. I really love how he brought in all of the different musicians, you know, Thundercat, Robert Glasper, Terence Martin, all of the homies. This was a real accomplishment."Watch this moment
"All Time Greatest Hits by The Mills Brothers, you know, I don't want to call them a boy group, but from the early days that idea of boy bands really comes from doo-wop, barber shop quartets. When I think about the level of talent these guys, they sing, they dance, they act."Watch this moment
"Enema of the State is another one where I remember when I heard it in the era of life that I was in. It feels like this stage in life, buying it on vinyl is a coronation of sorts, like okay now I'm an adult and I'm buying blink-182 on vinyl."Watch this moment
"Black On Both Sides, man, when I saw this I was struck by the cover... it’s probably the one hip-hop record that I first learned every lyric to. I could sing along to the entire album after about a week."Watch this moment
"the influence of both of these albums on what it is that I create is so embedded and seeped in so much like I knew the lyrics first and then I started to study the production techniques... it felt so right for the first time in my life."Watch this moment
"Dangerous, Michael Jackson... it's probably my favorite Michael record. It's really just, you know, I don't know, something about the scale of what he was doing, the darkness of it all, the struggle. It was just very, very dark in the lyrics."Watch this moment
Every picker shows up alone, sits down in front of the camera, and unpacks a bag. The next one is one click away.
