Moses Sumney – “I’ll Be Seeing You” (Billie Holiday Cover)

Matthew Foley

Moses Sumney – “I’ll Be Seeing You” (Billie Holiday Cover)

Matthew Foley

Last year, when he released his concert film A Performance In V Acts, Moses Sumney announced plans to “take a continued break from making albums and touring music to focus on other disciplines.” Right now, Sumney is doing a lot of acting. He’ll be in the forthcoming Ti West film MaXXXine and in The Idol, the controversial new HBO series from the Weeknd and Sam Levinson. But Moses Sumney hasn’t forgotten how to make music, and he’s contributed a cover of a classic to the soundtrack of the National Geographic series A Small Light.

A Small Light is a dramatic series about Anne Frank’s life, and Este Haim, one of the executive producers of the show’s soundtrack, has rounded up her contemporaries to cover songs from the World War II era. We’ve already posted the contributions from Danielle Haim, Kamasi Washington, Angel Olsen, Sharon Van Etten, and Weyes Blood. On the latest episode, Moses Sumney takes on the old standard “I’ll Be Seeing You.”

Sammy Fain and Irving Kahal wrote “I’ll Be Seeing You” for the short-lived Broadway play Right This Way in 1938. Many artists have recorded the song over the years, but the most famous version is the one that Billie Holiday recorded in 1944. Este Haim produced Moses Sumney’s version of the song, which captures the song’s bittersweet feeling and which gives Sumney a chance to stretch his remarkable voice while keeping the song’s melody at the center. Below, listen to the versions of the song from Sumney and Holiday.

In related news, Moses Sumney was at the Cannes premiere of The Idol yesterday. I guess we’re just throwing the whole Depp family up on this website today.

The full A Small Light soundtrack is out today.

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