Голос «Симпсонов» Хэнк Азария исполняет Бруса Спрингстина в новом шоу-трибьют

In 1976, 12-year-old Hank Azaria was at summer camp when a friend put on an album that instantly mesmerized him and changed the course of his life. Though he was introduced to a lot of new music that summer, it was Bruce Springsteen’s 1975 breakthrough album “Born to Run” that stuck with him the most. Decades later, Springsteen’s music has taken on a new role in Azaria’s life. For the past two years, Azaria — an actor best known for his iconic voice roles on “The Simpsons” — has been performing as “Hank Azaria and the EZ Street Band,” bringing to life the music of Springsteen while emulating the iconic singing voice and stage energy of “The Boss.” And on Saturday, August 29, Azaria and the band will take the stage at the Stephen Talkhouse in Amagansett for an evening when showgoers can chase the Promised Land as Azaria pays tribute to his musical icon. The idea for the project came about two years ago when Azaria turned 60, triggering what he called a “post-midlife crisis.” He noted that he had never thought much about age throughout his life, but when he reached this milestone, he “didn’t want to ignore it.” “But I didn’t want to lean into it either,” he said. He decided to throw a classic rock-themed birthday party, encouraging guests to come dressed as their favorite rock stars. He told them he was bringing in a Springsteen tribute band for the party, keeping it secret that behind the scenes, he had been working for months to get onstage and sing in the style of Springsteen himself. “I mostly wanted to give myself a vocal project to really focus on what would distract me from turning 60,” he said in a recent interview. “I really loved it more than I thought I would. I enjoyed learning to sing, really taking that seriously.” Azaria recruited keyboardist Adam Kromelow, who used to teach his son piano lessons, to assemble a band for the night. Kromelow delivered, bringing together a lineup of musical veterans he had worked with before — a lineup Azaria described as “a premade band family.” The performance was a hit, and Azaria and the band were even joined by longtime E Street Band drummer Max Weinberg for a few songs that night. Since then, Azaria has taken the show on the road, proving to fans all night that he’s a true Springsteen appreciator. This is far from Azaria’s first foray into singing — he appeared in the original Broadway production of Monty Python’s “Spamalot” in 2005 and has frequently sung on “The Simpsons.” But learning to sing like Springsteen — or rather, to imitate him — was a more serious endeavor than anything he had done prior. To properly emulate Springsteen’s distinct voice, he had to develop his upper vocal register to hit the high notes required for certain songs, a tough task given that Azaria’s natural voice is lower than Springsteen’s. Azaria described Springsteen as “almost like five singers in one.” Higher-energy songs take “a lot of breath” to sing properly, such as “Born in the U.S.A.,” but slower tracks like “Racing in the Street,” where Springsteen primarily uses his lower register, require a different kind of focus to sustain the notes. “It’s almost a line-by-line thing, where you kind of unlock, like any mimic would, each sound and try to get it,” he said. “You spend a week or two on this and that, and then eventually, hopefully, you have enough of the sounds right where you get a decent impression.” A distinct part of Springsteen’s voice is a gravelly undertone that gives his vocals extra edge and emotion. When Azaria was first developing his Springsteen voice, he leaned heavily into this quality. But when he started playing shows, he dialed it back, adding the gravel as “sort of a space on top” of what he was doing. “Bruce describes singing a concert as running a marathon while screaming, and now I understand what he means by that,” he said. “And so one of the things I learned to do is [figure out] what parts and what words of songs are sung, what are graveled through, and to what extent. That’s a big part of the impression — I’m still tinkering with that constantly.” When he’s onstage, Azaria doesn’t just sing like Springsteen; he speaks like him too, emulating how Springsteen talks to crowds on the bootleg concert tapes Azaria listened to growing up. He makes clear that he doesn’t see himself as a Springsteen impersonator — rather, it’s his sole desire to fully embody the spirit of Springsteen and his music. The band’s current repertoire consists both of hit songs that stand as classic rock radio staples and deep tracks, with shows typically alternating back and forth between the two. Recent additions to the setlist include “No Surrender,” “The Rising,” and “Because the Night” — the latter of which never received an official studio recording from Springsteen, but became a hit for the Patti Smith Group in 1978. There are around 30 songs that the group knows, and they are always adding more. Among those that Azaria hopes to add is “Kitty’s Back,” a favorite of many Springsteen diehards from 1973’s “The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle” that has long been one of Azaria’s personal favorites. Though Azaria has never met or spoken with “The Boss” himself, Springsteen is aware of the project’s existence. Azaria recalled a time when he was on a plane and got a text from the father of one of his son’s friends — an oral surgeon and fellow Springsteen fan — that moved him to tears. The text contained a video of Springsteen in a dental chair saying he was “fabulously entertained by your version of ‘Prove It All Night’” and commending Azaria for his rendition. This will be Azaria’s second appearance with the EZ Street Band at the Stephen Talkhouse, having first performed there in 2024. This show, along with others he has performed, continues to take him back to that magical summer decades ago when he walked in the sun and discovered the music he would love for the rest of his life. “I love this music so much; it makes my childhood, my teenage years come alive again for me,” he said. “It keeps it alive for me. The best way I can express love for something is to imitate it as well as I can.”