Michael Stipe Shares New Spoken-Word Piece ‘Hum Desiderata’

Michael Stipe has released “Hum Desiderata,” a spoken-word and musical piece created for the sound-art platform Joyfully Waiting. Rather than a conventional single, the work sets Stipe’s recitation of Max Ehrmann’s well-known poem against an instrumental version of “Hum,” an unreleased track from his in-progress solo debut.

The recording pulls narration from his “Desiderata” installation at ICA Milan, combining it with music written and produced alongside longtime collaborator Andy LeMaster. Athens, Georgia artist Elizabeth Hatmaker adds additional vocals. The result is a quiet, textural preview of the sonic world Stipe has been building since he began, somewhat reluctantly, to craft a full-length album under his own name.

Stipe’s solo path has been slow and deliberate. In April, on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert, he performed “The Rest of Ever” and spoke of a song built from a recording of a tree in his backyard played back to itself. “It sounds like Daft Punk,” he said, explaining that he reworked the 250-year-old sea shanty “Drunken Sailor” for the lyrics. That mix of found sound, oddity, and melody reappears in “Hum Desiderata,” a piece less interested in pop structure than in atmosphere.

Since R.E.M. ended in 2011, Stipe has largely turned to visual art—photography, sculpture, video—with institutional exhibitions and four photobooks from Damiani. His occasional musical appearances have never felt like the main event. “Hum Desiderata” arrives as part of Joyfully Waiting’s ongoing series of audio exhibitions, placing Stipe’s voice amid a broader conversation rather than at its center.