If Lil Uzi Vert singing about his dead friends and failed relationships didn't already make you emotional, this piano cover of "XO Tour Llif3" will.
Flipping the bass-heavy TM88-produced original into a classical composition, The Theorist's piano cover manages to brings out the song's beauty and sadness in a way that has people leaving comments like, "If this isn't played at my funeral then I ain't dying."
"I remember getting hyped to see him at Coachella so I had this song on repeat and while listening to this," The Theorist tells us. "I realized how melodic and dynamic it was, thus leading to a piano cover." He continues, "To be honest, I don't cover a lot of trap artists because I thought people would find them boring. I'm really happy they connected with this one."
His YouTube channel has nearly 200 covers of other hip-hop and R&B songs and he tells us, "My formal music background is classical piano, although I most often listen to hip-hop and R&B. Drake and The Weekend are a couple of artists that I listen to a lot and I initially thought it would be fun to cover their songs on the piano."
"Eventually, I started posting my covers on YouTube and discovered that other people liked listening to piano covers of hip-hop and R&B songs as well," he continues. "This also led to a lot of cool opportunities. I’ve worked with a lot of artists & producers in the studio providing some melodic elements. I’ve also toured with PARTYNEXTDOOR playing at a few festivals including OVO Fest back in 2015."
If you like this, check out The Theorist's YouTube channel for more and if you want to learn how to play these covers, you can get sheet music arranged by him on Musicnotes. Find him on social media here and watch some of our favorite covers below.
So, with "XO Tour Llif3" blowing up and everyone imaginable wanting to put their own spin on it, is Lil Uzi Vert rap's next superstar? We look at Uzi's big year in the video below.
