Maggie Rogers Relies On Touring To 'Humanise' Her Rising Stardom

In February 2016 Maggie Rogers was just another music student at NYU when Pharrell Williams conducted a master class where he listened to — and critiqued — student work. Williams fell in love with Rogers' song Alaska, and when video of this hit the internet, Rogers became an instant hot name. Since then, everything that's happened — signing deals, endless touring, releasing her EP Now That The Light Is Fading — has been a whirlwind.

"It's felt pretty crazy, pretty overwhelming," says Rogers, 22. "My life has changed a lot. Mostly, that's being on tour all the time, but there's also this real natural transition. I just graduated college. That [year after] is a real crazy time for every postgraduate I know. It's such a change, figuring out how to be an adult. It's a weird thing... But, the only thing I've ever wanted to do with my life is make music, and now I have the opportunity to do that."

Rogers grew up "on the eastern shore of Maryland on the Chesapeake Bay". Her family wasn't musical, but she learnt harp and piano at eight years old, guitar and banjo at 13. That's when she started writing her own songs "as a way for [her] to process all the emotions of middle school"; by 16, she was producing them. Long before she was a Next Big Thing, Rogers released two albums of folkie singer-songwriter material, 2012's The Echo and 2014's Blood Ballet; the first coming out when she was in high school, the second in university. "Music was just something I always wanted to do, that always felt incredibly urgent to me. Songs have always been the way that I've understood and catalogued my life."

Alaska was written about a hiking trip in America's wildest state; Rogers, having grown up in "the middle of nowhere", spending her summers camping in Maine, is a proud "long distance hiker" ("being outside, without electricity, means a lot to me"). She sees parallels between her experiences hiking and her new form of travelling: endless touring. "The bus and the road feels a lot like a fancier way of hiking to me: you have a small group, not so many things, you're moving every day, and you have a great sense of purpose."

In the middle of a five-month-long tour, Rogers is looking forward to sleeping and recording, but is tight-lipped about her forthcoming LP. "I think of making a record as creating a body of work, a whole artistic statement," she offers. "Until that statement is complete, I don't really feel comfortable talking about it."

Touring has allowed Rogers — after finding fame in 'viral' fashion — to humanise her experiences as a rising musician. "My life has been changed by people behind computer screens, totally anonymous people that I've never met," she offers. "It's been really gratifying to go places — in America and Europe — that I've never been before, and to actually get to see the people who like my music, the people who changed my life."