About

“Phil Cook is a lightning bolt. He is a teacher and captor of music. He carries it within him at all times. No one has taught me more about music in my life than him. He is one of the great performers of our age … as time passes more and more people will find that out. I’m excited every time someone gets to discover Phil’s genius—a thing I’ve had the good fortune of knowing all my life.”—Justin Vernon, Bon Iver

For Phil Cook, it all started with piano. A prolific songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, solo artist, and in-demand musician whose collaborations have run the gamut of genre — as a founding member of beloved band Megafaun to work with The Blind Boys of Alabama, Bon Iver, Kanye West, and Hiss Golden Messenger, to name a few—Cook has always been a musician’s musician. A sweet and affable presence whose musical dexterity elevates every project he touches, Cook’s musical output and true sound has been hard to pin down. But even across all the work he’s done in his decades as a musician, he’s yet to release a proper piano album. In that way, “All These Years” is sort of the first proper introduction to Cook, to the way he can express himself with the most ease and reveal the deepest compartments of his heart.

All These Years is Cook’s first solo instrumental album on his primary instrument, recorded at NorthStar Church of the Arts in Durham, NC by his cousin and collaborator Brian Joseph (Bon Iver, Sufjan Stevens, Indigo Girls). Cook and Joseph have been close their entire lives, with Joseph being one of the people who knows the full depth of Cook’s relationship to the instrument.