Berklee student’s search for home leads to the top of NPR’s Tiny Desk contest

Far from the flashy sets and celebrity judges of TV singing competitions like “American Idol” and “The Voice,” a small corner desk in NPR’s Washington D.C. office has become one of this generation’s most competitive launching pads for early-career artists.

Over the last 16 years, NPR’s Tiny Desk concert series, which has hosted artists from Taylor Swift to Usher, has developed a devout following of music fans. Since 2015, the team behind Tiny Desk has also helped shine a light on early-career artists through their annual competition, which invites one winner to perform behind the iconic desk. Standing out among the 6,600 submissions in this year’s competition is no easy task, but one Boston-based artist has done just that.

Mae Valerio is a student at Berklee College of Music. Their song “Home” was recently included in NPR’s Top Shelf, a kind of finalist list of Tiny Desk contestants.

Valerio, 19, started writing the song in their first semester at Berklee, caught in what they described as a “never-ending loop” of feeling alienated wherever they go. Robin Hilton, a senior producer at NPR Music and a judge in this year’s competition, said he was moved by the opening lines of the song as Valerio sings “Oh my mother’s voice is leaking into my head, I’ve got my father’s nose and lack of self-respect.”

“There's just so many singer-songwriters. It's such a hard space to stand out in because it is so crowded and you're working with this really limited palette of sounds. You've got to have a great voice. You've got to have something really meaningful and purposeful to say and something that really resonates with people,” said Hilton. “Everything matters and has to connect. And that's certainly what Mae did in their song.”

The Tiny Desk team started Top Shelf in 2020 as a way of expanding the spotlight to more artists in the competition. “When we go through all of the entries, there's just so many amazing artists with amazing performances and songs,” Hilton said. “And we thought, ‘There's got to be a way for us to share more of what we're seeing.’”

Along with Top Shelf, the Tiny Desk team is celebrating the competition’s tenth anniversary by bringing on more big-name artists — including MUNA and Julien Baker— to help judge the entries. For the first time, the winner will be connected with a mentor who will help guide them through the wave of attention that winning the competition brings. Listeners will also get a chance to vote for their favorite entry from the Top Shelf series, with the fan-favorite artist getting highlighted by NPR later, after the official competition winner is announced.

After an unsuccessful submission last year, Valerio said they couldn’t believe the news when NPR reached out to tell them their song was being included on Top Shelf. “I was sitting on my couch at home . . . next to my mom and I got an email and I was like, ‘Is this real?’ So I gave it to my mom and she's like, ‘Yeah, it's real.’ I was like, ‘Whoa, that's pretty cool,” they recalled, laughing.

In their submission, Valerio said, “‘Home’ is both the literal place, and it's that intoxicating feeling of belonging that we all seek.” That sentiment is most clear in the chorus, as Valerio achingly repeats: “I want to go anywhere but here, anywhere but home.”

“I love when a chorus sounds phonetically the same, but like a little bit shifted of a meaning. Or just like, the lyrics change a little bit,” they said.

That drive to escape — from home, from town, from the feeling of performing socially for others — expands from one verse to the next, shifting from angst to some form of catharsis as Valerio concludes the song belting: “Leave me alone, I wanna go home.”

Growing up paralyzed by social anxiety, Valerio said performing for people was often the only way they felt comfortable connecting with others. “I have a problem with being vulnerable, but you would never guess it because my lyrics are so vulnerable,” they said.

Valerio recently put on a small concert in their Fenway apartment. They plucked strings on their guitar as friends took their seats on pillows dotting the floor. They told the audience they had just read an online how-to guide about things to talk about before a performance, and after a few minutes of nervous banter, they settled into their guitar.

As Valerio waits for NPR to announce the competition winner this month, they said they’re proud of themselves for making it this far in the competition. “I have some weird issues with being proud of myself,” they said. “But, through these past few weeks, I've been able to give myself some credit.”