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fter graduating from Yale, where he studied musical composition, Ellis Ludwig-Leone secluded himself in Alberta, Canada, for six months to work on his debut album as San Fermin. The result, last year’s self-titled San Fermin, mixes Ludwig-Leone’s Classical background with a healthy does of Chamber Pop, yielding a dynamic, richly textured record that was one of 2013’s best. The band’s new album is being previewed on its current tour and will be released next year.
The debut album’s undeniable centerpiece, “Sonsick,” is wistful, orchestral Pop of the highest order, its soaring vocals, expressive horns and reflective lyrics conjuring a meld of Sufjan Stevens and Dirty Projectors. Ludwig-Leone recently took time out of his busy schedule — besides touring with San Fermin, he’s currently working on “a couple ballets” — to discuss his band’s rather rapid evolution from nonexistence to a well-oiled touring and recording unit.
CityBeat:
You guys have been touring pretty much nonstop over the last year. What’s it been like for you to go from being secluded by yourself in Canada to being in a fully formed touring unit?
Ellis Ludwig-Leone:
It’s been great. It’s all been sort of unexpected, because when I wrote the record I wasn’t even planning on it being like a touring thing. I didn’t even really think about it. It’s been such a lifestyle change. It’s been kind of unbelievable.
CB:
I saw you guys at the MidPoint Music Festival last year, which I think was before the record was even out [the show still sold out]. It sounded like you had been playing together forever. How did you pull that off?
ELL:
Yeah, that was literally like our fourth or fifth show. I think it starts with really good musicians. I happened to know a lot of them from school and from wherever else in New York. So when I put the band together I already knew I had a lot of talent on my hands. They’re hard songs to play, but it was a fast learning curve because the players are all pretty excellent.
CB:
Given your Classical background, why were you interested in going into a more Pop-oriented direction with the band?
ELL:
I guess it had to with the fact that in high school I was always in Rock bands and it always felt natural. Then at college it was really like the thing that was happening there was Classical music, so I got involved with that. But at the end of the day I just sort of wrote what I wanted to write. I guess we ended up in whatever world we ended up in.
CB:
I read that [lead male singer] Allen [Tate] was the only specific musician you had in mind while writing it. How did his presence inform the songs?
ELL:
Yeah, he was the only person that I really thought about, because the band hadn’t been formed yet. I had been in other bands with Allen and I just knew that his voice was the one that I was sort of imagining singing these things. That was sort of the impetus writing the record.
CB:
Lyrically, one of my favorite moments on the record is the line from “Sonsick” about playing in tee-ball games. It’s such a specific and evocative line. Was that something inspired from your own experience?
ELL:
Yes. I was trying to describe that sort of suburban life. I played tee-ball, and I remember my parents suffering through it. It was always hot and there were always bugs. I think that memory came from that. It’s just a nice thing to say. Tee-ball is kind of a good word.
CB:
I don’t remember ever hearing that word in another song.
ELL:
That’s something maybe you do think about near the end of the process — what makes the song different from other songs.
CB:
Yet the songs also have a strong resemblance to other current Indie Pop artists like Sufjan Stevens and Dirty Projectors. And Allen’s voice sounds a lot like Matt Berninger’s of The National. Were those artists that inspired you when figuring out what you wanted San Fermin to sound like?
ELL:
For sure. I guess it reflects well on listeners that they recognize that. I wrote the record right out of college, so those are all bands that I grew up with. They are all touchstones for me in terms of sounds I was looking for. But now that we’ve been touring and I’ve written the second record, the challenge is to get out from under those influences and try to find something that feels very specific to you.
CB:
Now that the band is pretty set in its configuration and sound, how did that impact the writing of the new songs? Did you feel kind of reined in by the fact that it’s now a concrete entity?
ELL:
I think grounded is a better word for it. It’s nice because now you’re writing for people who you know and care about, and so it’s this very personal thing. Sure, it does maybe dictate a little bit about what you’re going to write, but I think that’s a good thing. I think the band needs to have a specific sound, and that first record was kind of wild. Now the songs feel much more specific to this group. I like that a lot.
CB:
So the new record will be significantly different from the first?
ELL:
It knows what it is a lot more. The songs sound like they’re all part of the same world a little bit more. But the songs themselves are actually more manic. There are drastic changes in the middle of songs and things get really fucked up for a second and then come back and [are] very normal. I was looking for a sound that was a little darker and maybe a little more manic, and I think we definitely found that. ©
SAN FERMIN performs Wednesday, Nov. 12 at The Woodward Theater. More info/tickets: facebook.com/thewoodwardtheater.
This article appears in Nov 5-11, 2014.