Nearly fifty years into his career, legendary singer-songwriter Elvis Costello is still hard at work. Last week, Costello released his latest album Spanish Model, a re-recorded, Spanish-language version of his classic 1978 album This Year’s Model. The album was accompanied by an ongoing video series documenting its creation. Now, Costello is back with another project, How to Play the Guitar and Y, a new Audible Original releasing today (September 16th).
How to Play the Guitar and Y is the latest installment in Audible’s ever-expanding Words + Music series. Whereas most artists have used their Words + Music entries to explore their musical inspirations and share stories from their lives, Costello saw the opportunity as a unique chance to teach and directly change his audience’s lives.
The resulting work is a wildly entertaining blend of creative short stories, wonky music lessons, and short musical interludes that show off Costello’s wit and sagacity.
To get a better idea of the creative process behind How to Play the Guitar and Y, Consequence spoke with Costello by email to talk about his vision for the project. You can grab the Audible Original here, and check out the Q&A below.