“This is my favourite part. I knew it was good because I couldn’t get through it without sobbing”: Bon Iver breaks down his duet with Danielle Haim in BBC’s Maida Vale Studios

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Bon Iver's Justin Vernon has given us an insight into the production and songwriting behind three tracks from his new album SABLE, fABLE in an hour-long video for BBC radio station 6 Music, filmed at the historic Maida Vale Studios with Jim-E Stack, who co-produced the project.

Walking us through the genesis of If Only I Could Wait, a duet with Danielle Haim, Vernon recalls an extended session with Haim and Stack that unfolded over several days in 2022 at his Wisconsin studio April Base.

"You and Danielle showed up on the 21st, and there was a huge snowstorm," he remembers. "The plan was that you guys were gonna get hotels, but we all just got snowed in for four days."

The song wasn't recorded in the main studio, Vernon says, but a smaller space he began working in during Covid: "We have April Base studios, a bigger thing that's been a work in progress over the years, but then during Covid I set up a room about half the size of this that didn't sound very good, but had a lot of vibe in it."

The idea that sparked the song's creation was a rhythmic pattern programmed by Stack, a syncopated loop made up of crunchy hi-hats and snares. "I have to shout you out," Vernon says. "Your programming sounds so classic, the best breakbeats and beats. That little hi-hat pattern sounds like a whole melody - it had the song in it. That was the stone that we made the song out of."

The next addition was a synth stab - also one of Stack's sounds - run through a delay. "I was flipping through samples and stuff, and I accidentally hit this, just a little stab... and you were just like: 'that!'", recalls Stack. "It's classic you and me. A little drum loop, a little chunk of music and it's the seed for what becomes this incredible flower of a song."

Vernon reveals that Haim was initially recording background vocals for the song, before one of her improvised scratch vocal lines prompted him to reimagine the track as a duet, referencing Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash and George Jones and Tammy Wynette as inspirations.

"We must have made 30 ideas over those few days, and anything we made, Danielle and I would both take a pass to try and see if there's any melodies," Vernon adds. "She just sang this whole part that was totally different to what I was singing, and it was at that moment that I was like: this is a duet.

With the fundamentals in place, Vernon and Stack recall that it wasn't until the string parts, composed and performed by longtime collaborator Rob Moose, were added that the song felt complete. "I love him so much, and we have this musical language that we've built over more than a decade," Vernon says of Moose.

Treating us to a listen through the track's isolated string parts, Vernon singles out Moose's contribution as his favourite element of the song: "This is my favourite part. I knew it was good because I couldn’t get through it without sobbing," he admits.

Released in April, SABLE, fABLE is Bon Iver's fifth studio album and the group's first in five years. The project features contributions from Dijon, Flock of Dimes, Mk.gee and Jacob Collier, among others.

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