Lars Gotrich | February 7, 2025 Yasmin Williams is a fingerstyle guitarist who taps, slaps and slides up and down the fretboard of her instrument with a commanding sense of scenery that flickers between the strings. Storytellers build worlds; at the Tiny Desk, Williams invites us into hers.
Each song in this performance is a chapter that introduces the characters in and around her music. "Hummingbird" features the clawhammer banjo of Allison de Groot and fiddle of Tatiana Hargreaves — they're fixtures in the old-time music scene who help to bring this rapturous romp to life. (And, aside from recording "Hummingbird" for Acadia, this is only the second time that the trio has performed the composition together.) The majestic "Sisters" invites strings, djembe and a 10-foot marimba behind the Desk to paint a picture of a beautiful Oregon town that, in Williams' estimation, needs some scenic overlooks.
We love a story that comes full circle. In 2018, we were mesmerized by Williams' Tiny Desk Contest entry, in which she performed "Guitka" with a kalimba taped to her guitar and tap shoes on her feet. She reprises the song here, with the help of djembe player Amadou Kouyate. "It's fun to do everything at the same time!" she tells the crowd, which includes family and friends from her Northern Virginia home. (Her mom beamed telling me about the time Williams won an NYU talent show as a college freshman.) When Williams closes with an early track, "Restless Heart," we're taken back to the beginning: A kid who'd whoop her brothers at Guitar Hero, fell in love with the instrument itself, but never lost her sense of play.