Lily DeTaeye is now a seasoned alt-rock singer moving up the ranks in New York City, but once upon a time, she cut her teeth as a teenage musician in central Iowa. She’ll be back in her native Des Moines to play a homecoming show at the Temple Theater on Friday, Nov. 13, accompanied by a crew of Iowa touring musicians and the choir of her alma mater, Valley High School.
“I think I talk too much about Iowa to my New York friends,” DeTaeye said. “I love the Midwest; I’m really proud of where I’m from.”
DeTaeye is currently on a tour of the Northeast and Midwest, promoting her third studio album, Even With My Eyes Closed. The dreampop-inspired record’s central theme is suburban nostalgia, described by DeTaeye in a press release as “a collection of memories built around first loves, late nights, heartbreak, house parties and the strange, beautiful realization that you’re leaving part of your life behind.”
Even With My Eyes Closed was recorded over the course of 100 hours between December 2025 and January 2026 with Bryan Vanderpool at Golden Bear Records in Des Moines.
“It was like the fastest, most cohesive process I’ve ever had for a record, and I love it,” DeTaeye said. “I’ll be approaching records like this in the future.”
Somewhere in those 100 hours, DeTaeye had the idea of getting her old high school’s choir involved.
“The record is obviously very harmony-heavy, and I realized that I was using all of the stuff that I learned in my high school choir classes, like solfege, just because [the harmonies] can be kind of intricate,” DeTaeye explained. “I was thinking that it might be kind of appropriate to go back to my choir teacher and ask if she had any interest in facilitating the choir joining us, without really thinking that it would actually work, and it did. This is my 10 year high school graduation anniversary, and these kids are in the time of life that I'm writing about, and so it just all kind of came together in a way.”
DeTaeye and her band have been rehearsing with the Valley High School choir over the past few weeks to prepare for Friday’s live Temple Theater performance. Her touring band is also comprised of Iowa musicians: Vanderpool on guitar, Steph Graham on bass and Chris Hansen on drums.
“I've played with them for, I don't even know how long at this point, five or six years now, maybe? They were my go-to people before I moved to New York, and they're still that way,” DeTaeye said. “I wouldn't want to do this with anybody else.”
DeTaeye’s already powerful new music will pack an extra punch when she layers in the choir. Des Moines’ Rutabaga will kick off the Nov. 13 show, adding another touching full-circle moment, as DeTaeye previously worked with several members of the band as they learned to perform through Girls Rock! Des Moines.
Tickets for DeTaeye’s homecoming show are available on the Des Moines Performing Arts website.
