Minnesota Now theme song writers reflect on show's fourth birthday

[MUSIC PLAYING] JOE HORTON: 1, 2, 3, 4.

NINA MOINI: I know you know this jam. It's our daily theme music here on Minnesota Now, and this weekend marks four years since MPR News kicked off this noontime news program, Minnesota Now. The show got started, really, to give our audience longer conversations with newsmakers, experts, and our neighbors across the state to help us understand our world better.

Our show is full of different guests and music every single day, except for one key element that stays the same, and it's our theme music. So to celebrate Minnesota Now's fourth birthday, we want to introduce all of you listeners to the people behind that key part of our show. Local musicians Aby Wolf and Joe Horton join me now. Aby and Joe, thanks for being here.

ABY WOLF: Good to be here.

JOE HORTON: Yeah, thanks for having us.

NINA MOINI: And thanks for being the heart and soul of the show here. It's been a long time, I guess, since you guys co-wrote this theme song, four years, I guess. Aby, tell me, if you remember, what this process was like composing this song for the show and working together.

ABY WOLF: Yeah. Hey, Nina, thanks for having us on to celebrate. Four years goes by in a flash.

NINA MOINI: Yeah.

ABY WOLF: Yeah. Joe Horton and I had worked together a couple times, a few years-- a few times over the years. And Joe was kind of on to do the lead for this particular theme song, so I was stoked to jump in. We really just kind of hung out in the living room and plunked around on a piano and a synthesizer until we were able to bounce some ideas back and forth. And Joe and another collaborator-- I think, is it Patrick, right?

JOE HORTON: Patrick Pegg, yeah.

ABY WOLF: Y'all took it from there, yeah.

NINA MOINI: Cool. So you had worked together before. What is that collaborative process like, Joe, when you were working together with somebody to compose something?

JOE HORTON: For something like this, it was really casual. I think Aby and I hadn't seen each other for a while when I hit her up about collaborating on the song. And so we honestly just hung out, drank tea, talked, played a little bit. It was a really casual, fun process. It was more like a hang session than a writing session, really.

NINA MOINI: Oh, I love that. So, Aby, did you have any kind of themes in mind or any-- what was your inspiration? What had they told you about the show?

ABY WOLF: Oh, yeah. I mean, basically the way that you laid it out in that longer conversations for folks here in Minnesota and the region to get to each other better, so that was a preface. And in terms of musical ideas, I don't think Joe or I had any kind of preconceived notions. We really just kept it really casual, like you said, and playful.

And I guess I've grown quite accustomed to working with others in a remote sort of way. Like, someone will pass me an idea that's sort of gelled, and then I can sit with it in my own space and then bounce it back to them. But to work with other people in the room together is quite a different-- requires a different level of playfulness. And so luckily, because Joe is super chill and easy to work with, that was not a problem at all.

NINA MOINI: I love this chill vibe because the producers and I were joking that usually by the time the show starts and we hear the theme music, we've all been sweating, we've been running around getting the show together. But I love that. It's kind of a reset, and then we jump into the show.

And I just appreciate you both coming on to talk about this because I know it's one thing among many that you both have done. And I do want to know, before we've got to go, just what's next for the both of you. So, Aby, I'll start with you. What are you up to now?

ABY WOLF: I've been doing a ton of performing, which I'm just so grateful performance has returned a big mainstay in what I get to do with my time, after the last few years when we all had to stop performing and stop gathering together. That's definitely back on, shows and studio sessions. So the rest of the year I've got quite a bit of stuff coming up. I work with a number of different artists as well as work on my own projects, too. So I've just got a slew of cool shows coming up.

NINA MOINI: Cool. Keeping busy. And, Joe, how about you?

JOE HORTON: Yeah, well, myself and a bunch of collaborators I've been working with for a long time, we work across a lot of mediums. We do photography, film, sound, spatial design. And so we collab and join forces on a experienced design studio called Mafic Ocean that takes all those disciplines and brings them together to create experiences, both our personal artwork that we release and music that we release, but also doing that for other folks as well. So that's been where I've been putting most of my energy lately.

NINA MOINI: All right. Gosh, Aby and Joe, thank you both so much for sharing your talents with us and for stopping by on the show's fourth birthday. Really appreciate your time.

JOE HORTON: Absolutely. Happy birthday.

ABY WOLF: Thanks, Nina.

NINA MOINI: Thank you. It was so cool. Those were Minneapolis musicians Aby Wolf and Joe Horton. They are the composers of the Minnesota Now theme music. And again, thank you all so much for listening to Minnesota Now for four whole years. We can't wait to bring it to you for years to come, and we're not done yet. Stay with us.