Maggie Rogers

Singer/songwriter Maggie Rogers combines folk, dance, and pop into an emotional yet crowd-pleasing sound. After self-releasing two albums of introspective acoustic songs and falling in love with EDM while in college, her first major success came with 2016′s viral hit “Alaska.” With her 2019 major-label debut, Heard It in a Past Life, she gave her music a pop polish while remaining true to her roots. The album hit number two on the Billboard 200 and earned her a Grammy nomination for Best New Artist. While 2020′s Notes from the Archive: Recordings 2011-2016 revealed more of her early folk work, Rogers has continued to evolve; embracing an ever more sophisticated pop sound as well as speaking out in support of voting and women’s rights. On the heels of graduating from Harvard Divinity School with a Master of Religion and Public Life degree, she returned to the Top 20 with her joyously anthemic sophomore album, 2022′s Surrender. Following 2023′s “Dawns,” a duet with Zach Bryan, Rogers heralded her third album, 2024′s Don’t Forget Me, with the title-track single. Growing up in Easton, Maryland, Rogers began playing harp at age seven and loved the music of Gustav Holst and Vivaldi. Meanwhile, her mom played her neo-soul divas like Erykah Badu and Lauryn Hill; by the time she was in middle school, she’d added piano, guitar, and songwriting to her repertoire. While studying at St. Andrews School in Delaware, she fell in love with the banjo and folk music, and attended a Berklee College of Music program during the summer after her junior year. Rogers won the program’s songwriting contest, which spurred her to focus on writing as high school came to a close. During her senior year, she turned a broom closet into a makeshift studio and recorded what became her first album, 2012′s The Echo; Rogers included her demos as part of her application to New York University’s Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music. During her freshman year, she transcribed and edited the interviews that became the 2017 book Meet Me in the Bathroom while she was an intern for music journalist Lizzy Goodman. She released another folky album, 2014′s Blood Ballet, while she was a sophomore. Over the next few years, Rogers’ sound evolved, thanks in part to her time in New York City and her discovery of electronic music while studying abroad in France. She united the different strands of her music to major success in 2016 with “Alaska,” a song she wrote in 15 minutes about a hiking trip for a master class with Pharrell Williams. A video of a visibly moved Williams listening to the song went viral that June, resulting in millions of views as well as hundreds of thousands of plays of The Echo and Blood Ballet. Later that month, she released the finished version of “Alaska,” which reached number 18 on Billboard’s Hot Rock Songs chart. Rogers signed a deal with Capitol Records that allowed her to retain ownership of her masters and created her own Debay Sounds imprint, on which the Now That the Light Is Fading EP appeared in February 2017. A single from the EP, “On + Off,” peaked at number 44 on the Hot Rock Songs chart that month. In September 2017, Rogers issued the single “Split Stones,” a favorite in her live shows, before concentrating on making her debut album. Featuring production by Greg Kurstin, Rostam, and Ricky Reed, Heard It in a Past Life arrived in January 2019; that month, the single “Light On” hit number one on Billboard’s Adult Alternative Songs chart, and helped earn Rogers a nomination for Best New Artist at the 2020 Grammy Awards. Later in 2020, Rogers delivered a virtual performance at that year’s Democratic National Convention and recorded a cover of the Goo Goo Dolls’ “Iris” with Phoebe Bridgers that benefitted the voting rights organization Fair Fight Action. That December, she released Notes from the Archive: Recordings 2011 – 2016, a collection of early recordings that touched on the Echo and Blood Ballet days and included several previously unreleased songs. Along with her music career, Rogers enrolled for graduate study at Harvard Divinity School where she graduated in May 2022 with a Master of Religion and Public Life degree. That July, she delivered her sophomore full-length album, Surrender. Produced with Kid Harpoon, the album found her drawing up her religion studies and ruminating on the troubled state of the world with a series of defiantly joyful anthems. It reached number 12 on the Billboard 200 and two on the Top Rock/Alternative Albums chart. “Dawns,” a collaboration with Zach Bryan, peaked at 42 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 2023. In 2024, Rogers returned with her third full-length album, Don’t Forget Me, featuring the poignant, self-assured title-track single. Produced with songwriter and instrumentalist Ian Fitchuk, the album showcased a more stripped-down, rock- and folk-influenced style than its predecessor. ~ Heather Phares