Ben Folds - Ben Folds Live with The National Symphony Orchestra (Live) '2025

Tracks list

	Tracklist:

1. Ben Folds & National Symphony Orchestra, Kennedy Center – But Wait,
There's More (feat. Steven Reineke) [Live] (03:43)
2. Ben Folds & National Symphony Orchestra, Kennedy Center – Fragile
(feat. Steven Reineke) [Live] (04:25)
3. Ben Folds & National Symphony Orchestra, Kennedy Center – Kristine
From The 7th Grade (feat. Steven Reineke) [Live] (05:42)
4. Ben Folds & National Symphony Orchestra, Kennedy Center – Effington
(with Tall Heights) [feat. Steven Reineke & Tall Heights] [Live] (03:55)
5. Ben Folds & National Symphony Orchestra, Kennedy Center – The Luckiest
(feat. Steven Reineke) [Live] (04:46)
6. Ben Folds & National Symphony Orchestra, Kennedy Center – Capable of
Anything (feat. Steven Reineke) [Live] (03:54)
7. Ben Folds & National Symphony Orchestra, Kennedy Center – Still
Fighting It (with Tall Heights) [feat. Steven Reineke & Tall Heights] [Live]
(06:11)
8. Ben Folds & National Symphony Orchestra, Kennedy Center – You Don't
Know Me (feat. Regina Spektor) [Live] (03:37)
9. Ben Folds & National Symphony Orchestra, Kennedy Center – Landed
(feat. Steven Reineke) [Live] (05:17)
10. Ben Folds & National Symphony Orchestra, Kennedy Center – Still (from
Over The Hedge) [feat. Steven Reineke] [Live] (03:16)
11. Ben Folds & National Symphony Orchestra, Kennedy Center – Cologne
(feat. Steven Reineke) [Live] (05:58)
12. Ben Folds & National Symphony Orchestra, Kennedy Center – Moments
(feat. Tall Heights) [Live] (04:05)
13. Ben Folds & National Symphony Orchestra, Kennedy Center – Gracie
(feat. Steven Reineke) [Live] (03:03)
14. Ben Folds & National Symphony Orchestra, Kennedy Center – Not The
Same (feat. Steven Reineke) [Live] (04:38)


 moreA native of Greensboro, North Carolina, Benjamin Scott Folds attended
the University of Miami's Frost School of Music on a full percussion scholarship
before losing said scholarship and dropping out after a broken hand prevented
him meeting jury requirements for his degree. Folds threw his kit in the campus
lake and returned to North Carolina. Following a late-'80s stint playing bass
for the band Majosha, he spent several years in Nashville working largely as a
session drummer. Folds dabbled in acting after relocating to New York, while
performing solo gigs around the city and further developing his piano and
songwriting skills.

Moving back again to North Carolina, in 1994 Folds formed Ben Folds Five, a trio
that also included bassist Robert Sledge and drummer Darren Jessee. Whereas most
alternative bands of the '90s specialized in distorted teen-angst rock, the
guitarless trio was a refreshing break from the norm, its sound akin to such
past power popsters as Todd Rundgren, Jellyfish, and early Joe Jackson, and such
piano-driven artists as Billy Joel and early Elton John. But like punk bands,
Ben Folds Five put on a high-energy, blistering live show. Their self-titled
debut arrived in 1995 on Caroline Records, yielding their first cult hit,
"Underground." With some help from MTV's 120 Minutes and plenty of touring, the
band generated enough buzz to land a deal with Epic Records, which issued their
follow-up.

Released in 1997, Whatever and Ever Amen proved to be Ben Folds Five's
commercial breakthrough, thanks in part to the single "Brick." Unlike the
majority of Ben Folds Five's material, which was upbeat, the song contained
melancholic music and vocals, as the lyrics told the story of a teenage couple
who decide to get an abortion, a story later confirmed by Folds to be
autobiographical. Eventually going platinum in the U.S., Whatever also fared
similarly abroad, particularly in Australia and Japan.

While 1998 didn't see a new studio album by the band, their former label,
Caroline, issued a 16-track rarities collection (Naked Baby Photos), while Folds
released his first solo album, Volume 1, under the pseudonym Fear of Pop.
Although the solo effort went largely unnoticed, it included the song "In Love,"
which featured some melodramatic vocals from none other than Captain Kirk
himself, William Shatner, and which was performed on The Conan O'Brien Show
shortly after the album's release. Ben Folds Five regrouped with 1999's The
Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner, which was a more mature work than
its predecessors, and featured some of Folds' strongest songwriting to date.
Although it became their first album to crack the Billboard albums Top 40
(peaking at 35), it would prove to be the band's last record for over a decade.

Folds made his official solo debut with Rockin' the Suburbs, a more diversely
arranged set that arrived in late 2001 and went to number 42 in the States and
number 18 in Australia. A 2003 live effort, Ben Folds Live, was followed by a
series of EPs before Folds returned to the piano trio format with the
introspective Songs for Silverman in 2005. It went all the way to number 13 on
the Billboard 200 and to nine on the ARIA chart in Australia. Lead single
"Landed" became Folds' first original solo song to crack the Billboard Hot 100,
where it peaked at 77. Comprising covers, soundtrack entries, and EP material,
he released the compilation Supersunnyspeedgraphic: The LP in 2006, followed by
the Dennis Herring-produced full-length Way to Normal in 2008. Featuring a duet
with Regina Spektor ("You Don't Know Me"), Way to Normal reached a
solo-career-high number 11 in the U.S. That same year saw a reunion show by Ben
Folds Five during which they performed their third album in its entirety.

In 2009, Folds contributed two songs to University A Cappella!, a collection of
covers of some of Folds' best tracks by various university groups. Continuing to
branch out in varied directions, Folds joined NBC's a cappella talent show The
Sing-Off as one of the judges, a job he would hold for three seasons. Lonely
Avenue, a collaboration with British novelist/essayist Nick Hornby (High
Fidelity, About a Boy), arrived in 2010, followed by the 18-track Retrospective:
The Best Imitation of Myself 1995-2011, which represented Folds' first U.S.
career overview. The compilation included a new song with the original Ben Folds
Five, who re-formed and released their fourth studio album, The Sound of the
Life of the Mind, in September 2012. It became Folds' highest-charting effort to
date in the States, peaking at number ten on the Billboard 200 and reaching the
Top Three of the alternative chart. It also hit the Top 40 in the U.K. and
Australia. The concert album Ben Folds Five Live followed in mid-2013.

In 2015, Folds released So There, an eight-track collection of chamber pop
originals that he recorded with New York City-based classical sextet yMusic. The
album also included a performance of his "Concerto for Piano and Orchestra" with
the Nashville Symphony. His debut for the New West label, the album reached
number one on Billboard's classical and classical crossover charts. Over the
following years, Folds issued a pair of live albums, In Concert 2015-2016 and
Live in Perth, the latter recorded with the West Australian Symphony Orchestra.
In 2017, theNational Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center in Washington,
D.C. named Folds the organization's first ever artistic advisor. A year later,
Edsel issued the exhaustive Brick: The Songs of Ben Folds 1995–2012, a
13-disc box set that included all four Ben Folds Five albums, all of his solo
albums (up until 2012), live recordings, B-sides, and other bonus material.
Ballantine Books published Folds' memoir, A Dream About Lightning Bugs, in July
of 2019.

Folds launched a podcast, Lightning Bugs: Conversations with Ben Folds, in 2021,
to speak with artists about their creative processes. In 2022, he contributed
the title song to the Apple TV+ special It's the Small Things, Charlie Brown
and, following occasional guest spots on shows like Community and You're the
Worst, Folds had a recurring role on Amazon Prime drama The Wilds. He returned
to piano pop in June 2023 with the album What Matters Most (New West). Recorded
in East Nashville with producer Joe Pisapia, its many contributors included Tall
Heights, Dodie, Ruby Amanfu, and yMusic's Rob Moose (string arrangements). Next
up for the singer/songwriter was his first-ever holiday album, Sleigher, which
in true Folds fashion was an atypical one. Consisting of seven original songs
and three reworked classics, including the Burt Bacharach deep cut "The Bell
That Couldn’t Jingle," it arrived on New West in October of 2024. That
same month, while out on his Paper Airplanes Request Tour, he recorded a concert
album with the NSO in D.C. © Marcy Donelson



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