Maren Morris was nearly done with her seven-song set at The Stephen Talkhouse in Amagansett, New York when her face got dead serious. “This is the song that turned me into an artist and not just a singer-songwriter,” she told the crowd as part of the acclaimed Soho Sessions series that brings A-list artists to more intimate spaces for various charities.
Morris is more accustomed to theaters and amphitheaters these days. But in this 250-person venue nestled squarely in the Hamptons, she brought out opener Yola for “My Church,” the first single from her 2016 debut album Hero.
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“Is it okay if we take you to church on this last one?,” Morris asked the crowd as seen in the video above. Morris solos the first verse before Yola, whose booming voice and ebullient stage presence across five songs earlier tonight was its own spiritual presence, joined her on the singer’s breakout hit.
Morris turned the set, which included “The Bones,” “Girl,” “Dreamsicle,” and “80s Mercedes,” into a VH1 Storytellers. “Girl,” she said, was inspired by “weird shit with a friend,” while the intro to “80s Mercedes” led Morris on a long story about her mom’s obsession with Richard Gere and American Gigolo.
“I started dating a little bit [after my divorce] and just met some fucking bums that couldn’t pay the tab,” she told the crowd on what inspired her song “Too Good.” “I brought to my cowriters this idea, and I was like, ‘I’ve been dating a few losers. I think it’s just a stroke of bad luck. It’s gonna end soon.’”
Elsewhere, she entranced on “Angel From Montgomery,” the 1971 John Prine song popularized by Bonnie Raitt three years later that was the “first song I ever learned on guitar.”
The event raised money for Music Will, the largest nonprofit music education program for schools in the United States, and was sponsored by the FLAG Art Foundation, a “nonprofit exhibition space that mounts thematic contemporary art exhibitions centering on emerging and established artists from around the globe.”
“It was such a pleasure performing for an intimate listening crowd at Soho Sessions,” Morris said in a statement. “We shared stories, I got to sing with the incredible Yola and help raise money for music education, an endeavor close to my heart. The charitable cause and the audience are just as important as the featured artist.”
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