Amanda Seyfried can sing. That’s not her main occupation. She’s a movie star. But Seyfried’s movie stardom has offered her a few opportunities to show what she can do musically. She was in Mamma Mia, so that’s a big one. As a guest on The Tonight Show earlier this year, she brought out a dulcimer and sang an instantly legendary cover of Joni Mitchell’s “California.” Seyfried plays the lead in The Testament Of Ann Lee, director Mona Fastvold’s new musical drama about the real-life founder of the Shakers, the religious sect. On the soundtrack, she’s got a duet with the guy from Yuck, and we get to hear it today.
OK, fine: Daniel Blumberg is not the guy from Yuck anymore. Blumberg did once lead Yuck, the great old-school indie rock band from the UK. He has since moved on to bigger things. Last year, Blumberg composed the stirring score for Brady Corbet’s The Brutalist, and he won an Oscar for it. He could conceivably get another one for scoring The Testament Of Ann Lee, another collaboration with the same team. (Brady Corbet and Mona Fastvold co-wrote both The Brutalist and The Testament Of Ann Lee.)
Blumberg rearranged a bunch of old Shaker hymns for The Testament Of Ann Lee. He also wrote three original songs, one of which is “Clothed By The Sun,” his new duet with Amanda Seyfried. Blumberg sings lead on most of the track, but it doesn’t sound anything like Yuck. Instead, it’s a stark, somber, pretty piece of music. In a press release, Blumberg says:
I wrote this song in the final days of making the film, holed up in the Berlin mixing studio. After a year immersed in the film, Ann Lee’s world was in my bones. I was missing my brother, and her relationship with [her brother] William moved me, so I began with that line about a brother’s love.
Amanda recorded vocals the next day in New York. It was meant to be her solo, but it became a duet because Mona loved the atmosphere it created at the end of the film. The contemporary feel suited the final cards about the Shakers today. Amanda and I sang together often during the film’s recording sessions, so it’s lovely to finally have a track of us together — and a good excuse for some live shows.
Check it out below.
Speaking of live shows, Daniel Blumberg and Amanda Seyfried performed “Clothed By The Sun” together at London’s Café OTO in October.
I was eeeeever so slightly ambivalent about The Testament of Ann Lee at Venice but I’m at a point where I’m desperate for round two. This Cafe Oto performance of the score with Daniel Blumberg and Amanda Seyfried has fed that urge tenfold. pic.twitter.com/Faq23ZZkJI
— douglas greenwood (@douglasgrnwd) October 12, 2025
Also, Amanda Seyfried returned to The Tonight Show last night, and she talked about the aftermath of her Joni Mitchell cover, including approval from Mitchell herself.
The Testament Of Ann Lee opens in select theaters on Christmas, and it’ll get a wider release in January.
