The Decemberists have put to music an unused set of lyrics that Lin-Manuel Miranda originally wrote for Hamilton. As the band explains in a post on their website, Miranda reached out to Colin Meloy to ask them to record a version of “Ben Franklin’s Song,” which was cut from the show after Miranda couldn’t figure out how to use Ben Franklin as a character. “Funnily enough, he said he’d imagined Franklin singing in a sort of Decemberist-y way, whatever that means,” the band writes.
Miranda says that this is the start of what’s calling The Hamildrops series, where he’ll release a new piece of Hamilton content every month until December of next year. You can listen to the Decemberists’ version of “Ben Franklin’s Song” below.
This article originally appeared on Stereogum.
