James Blake\u2019s music often sits between genres, drawing on gospel-leaning piano balladry, R&B melody, the low-end pressure of club music and the warped textures of electronic production. Bay Area audiences had a recent reminder of his range during San Francisco Ballet\u2019s \u201cThe Blake Works,\u201d a William\u00a0Forsythe program set to the British musician\u2019s tracks, which opened Feb. 27, at the War Memorial Opera House.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Now fans can hear Blake perform live when he brings his touring show behind his latest album, \u201cTrying Times,\u201d to the Greek Theatre on Thursday-Friday, June 11-12.<\/p>\n
The classically trained pianist is known for a voice that can feel intimate even when surrounded by skeletal beats, pitch-shifted harmonies and deep bass. On \u201cTrying Times,\u201d Blake\u2019s first independent studio album after departing his longtime label, Polydor Records, he leans into songs built from piano, guitar and spare rhythm tracks while retaining the anxious, atmospheric quality that has long marked his work.<\/p>\n
Jameela Jamil (\u201cThe Good Place\u201d), Blake\u2019s longtime partner, is credited as executive producer and A&R on the album, with production credits on several tracks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"James Blake\u2019s music often sits between genres, drawing on gospel-leaning piano balladry, R&B melody, the low-end pressure of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":346478,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[329,7,35717,332,330,143,145,144],"class_list":["post-346477","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-oakland","tag-arts-and-entertainment","tag-california","tag-datebook-pick","tag-east-bay","tag-music","tag-oakland","tag-oakland-headlines","tag-oakland-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/346477","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=346477"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/346477\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/346478"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=346477"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=346477"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=346477"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}