My First Band Podcast

Ellis Ludwig-Leone has spent most of his life immersed in music. Long before the Yale-educated composer and songwriter made his mark with San Fermin, the Brooklyn indie rock collective's bandleader was a kid in rural Massachusetts looking to challenge himself with classical music and Russian "knuckle-busters" during piano lessons. In high school, he wound up playing keyboard in a short-lived instrumental metal outfit, followed by a stint performing Ben Folds and Eagle-Eye Cherry covers at Sweet 16 parties in a cover band. While at a Berklee College of Music summer camp, Ludwig-Leone struck up a friendship with a fellow camper named Allen Tate, and the rest was history. Recently, prior to a show at Milwaukee's Turner Hall Ballroom in support of San Fermin's recently released The Cormorant I, Ludwig-Leone met My First Band host Tyler Maas in the venue's balcony to talk about his formative early auditory endeavors, starting a project with Tate while they were going to college in different states and how San Ferm