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Van Dyke Parks Lifts Gaby Moreno's Voice On Spectacular '¡Spangled!'

Van Dyke Parks, left, and Gaby Moreno check in with each other about their new album <em>Spangle</em>.
Courtesy of the artist
Van Dyke Parks, left, and Gaby Moreno check in with each other about their new album Spangle.

Gaby Moreno's ¡Spangled! is a collaboration with Van Dyke Parks, a music arranger who has worked from everyone from The Beach Boys to U2 to Skrillex. His job is to arrange the little black dots on a music manuscript page into sounds from strings, horns and voices that add texture and context to the songs.

Parks' arrangements on ¡Spangled! lift Moreno's voice into a place that will delight and surprise her long-time fans as well as impress those who are just discovering her.

They stopped by the Alt.Latino West Coast Satellite Nerve Center for a deep dive into their unlikely collaboration and, of course, some laughs.

Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Felix Contreras is co-creator and host of Alt.Latino, NPR's pioneering radio show and podcast celebrating Latin music and culture since 2010.