Nathan Halpern
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Nathan Halpern

Brooklyn, New York, United States | INDIE

Brooklyn, New York, United States | INDIE
Solo Classical Singer/Songwriter

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This band has not uploaded any videos
This band has not uploaded any videos

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"MTV at CMJ: Nathan Halpern and the Lusty Men"

“I love you…in a way,” Nathan Halpern sang on Wednesday night at his CMJ showcase performance at the Delancey on the Lower East Side. It was a typical Halpern lyric. Halpern is a writer of love songs that aren’t so much about love itself as love’s dark edges, where passion and longing mix with regret and ambivalence. If his songs feel more intimate than most, that’s because Halpern–like his musical forbearer Leonard Cohen, to whom he’s obviously indebted–insists on being truthful, even when the truth is difficult to admit or painful to hear. “Baby, I know that you hate me, and I really can’t blame you.”

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Halpern sings in the rough, urgent, powerful baritone of a 1950s crooner, a voice at once vulnerable and masculine, and his compositions are prime examples of sturdy old-school craftsmanship, with hooks and melodies and climaxes that combine to evoke the popular songs of forty and fifty years ago and yet amount to something unmistakably new. As for his band, the aptly named Lusty Men, joined on Wednesday by the back-up singer Kerry Kennedy, it rocks. Andrew Platt doubles with muscle and dexterity on bass and piano; electric-fiddle player Bob Pycior supplies screeches and lovely flourishes; and the muscular rock drummer Tim Nelson serves as Halpern’s ideal foil, providing a solid-as-brick foundation for the singer’s expressions of ambivalence. Hidden in the shadows, obscured by fedora and Biblical beard, lead-guitarist Par Parekh plays melodic five-note solos with the demented urgency of Crazy Horse-era Neil Young. - MTV


"Nathan Halpern - Small Beast Show Review (NYC 7/09)"

Nathan Halpern at Small Beast (at the Delancey)

Nathan Halpern really opened some eyes after that...[he] proved to be a first-rate songwriter, sort of Orbison seen through the warped prism of Pulp. Halpern is a crooner, likes a counterintuitive, sardonically literate lyric and a big countrypolitan sound gone somewhat apprehensively askew. He’d build a crescendo to an unhinged tremolo-picking break, wailing up and down on the strings with a Black Angel’s Death Song style savagery. Backed by Andrew Platt alternating between piano, guitar and bass and drummer Heather Wagner adding marvelously subtle shades, Halpern made his way through a mix of big 6/8 anthems, a couple of jaunty, more overtly country-inflected numbers and closed with a towering, knowingly rueful number [titled] "Wait For Me." - LUCID CULTURE


"Nathan Halpern @ Zebulon with Salt & Samovar -- live review"

Nathan Halpern played an amazing set of soulful Americana with his band at a packed Zebulon on Friday. - roman game diary


"Nathan Halpern - Small Beast Show Review (NYC 7/09)"

Nathan Halpern at Small Beast (at the Delancey)

Nathan Halpern really opened some eyes after that...[he] proved to be a first-rate songwriter, sort of Orbison seen through the warped prism of Pulp. Halpern is a crooner, likes a counterintuitive, sardonically literate lyric and a big countrypolitan sound gone somewhat apprehensively askew. He’d build a crescendo to an unhinged tremolo-picking break, wailing up and down on the strings with a Black Angel’s Death Song style savagery. Backed by Andrew Platt alternating between piano, guitar and bass and drummer Heather Wagner adding marvelously subtle shades, Halpern made his way through a mix of big 6/8 anthems, a couple of jaunty, more overtly country-inflected numbers and closed with a towering, knowingly rueful number [titled] "Wait For Me." - LUCID CULTURE


"Live Review of Nathan Halpern opening for the Bellrays"

Nathan Halpern began his set with a cover of Buddy Holly's "Everyday" and then launched into a real boogie-woogie Elvis Presley-like romp with his fun band. And it was great. - Sonic Parthenon


"Live Review of Nathan Halpern opening for the Bellrays"

Nathan Halpern began his set with a cover of Buddy Holly's "Everyday" and then launched into a real boogie-woogie Elvis Presley-like romp with his fun band. And it was great. - Sonic Parthenon


Discography

"Marina Abramovic: The Artist Is Present" - Copticon Music
"New York: The Next Wave" (The Flesh) - Kanine Records
"Death Connection" (The Flesh) - Kanine Records
"Sweet Defeat" (The Flesh) - Gern Blandsten Records
"The Flesh" (The Flesh) - Gern Blandsten Records
"Firetower" (The Flesh) - Gern Blandsten Records

SELECTED FILMOGRAPHY (Original Score)
"All the President's Men Revisited" (Robert Redford/Discovery)
"Marina Abramovic: The Artist Is Present (HBO Films)
"Makers: Women Who Make America" (Meryl Streep/PBS)
"Renee" (ESPN Films"

Photos

Bio

Nathan Halpern is a Brooklyn-based composer and singer/songwriter, best known for his haunting film scores to such films as HBO Films' MARINA ABRAMOVIC: THE ARTIST IS PRESENT (winner of the 2013 Peabody Award), and Robert Redford's ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN REVISITED. His film music has been compared to Arvo Part, Philip Glass, and Angelo Badalamenti.

He brings this "hauntingly Lynchian" (New York Music Daily) cinematic sensibility to his string-laden, darkly romantic love songs, described by Lucid Culture as 'Roy Orbison as seen through the twisted prism of Pulp.' MTV.com compares his singing style to the "urgent, powerful baritone of a 1950s crooner, a voice at once vulnerable and masculine." Of his lyrics, THE DELI says: "The man isnt afraid to go 'all in' when revealing the most intimate truths of
love the ones that are so drenched in passion
and regret that most of us prefer to bury them."

As founder/frontman of NYC art-punks The Flesh, he put out several acclaimed records & EPs on Kanine Records (Grizzly Bear, Chairlift) and Gern Blandsten (Liars). They performed extensively throughout the USA and Europe, sharing the stage such luminaries as Ted Leo, The Gossip, Suicide, James Chance, and Tom Tom Club.

Halpern is currently completing an album of songs, and several film scores, including THE POISONER'S HANDBOOK, a noir murder tale for PBS.

Band Members