Tucker Zimmerman’s final album Dream Me A Dream to be released posthumously, new single out now

Tucker Zimmerman’s final album, Dream Me A Dream, is set to be released posthumously on June 19, and the single ‘Sun in Scorpio’ is out now. The American musician died with his wife, Marie-Claire, in a house fire this January. He was 84.

The announcement comes after Zimmerman’s most recent album, Music by River Words by Ear, and his collaborative 2024 album with the band Big Thief, Dance of Love. The album was originally set to be announced in January, but was postponed following Zimmerman’s death.

Zimmerman released 12 albums over the course of his 56-year career. His first, the simply titled Ten Songs By Tucker Zimmerman, was cited by David Bowie as one of his favorite albums.

Zimmerman was born in San Francisco, but lived most of his life in Belgium with his wife, who he met on a Fulbright Scholarship studying music in Rome.

Dream Me A Dream was a collaboration between Zimmerman and musician Nick Holton, and features contributions from folk musician Jackie Oates and Zimmerman’s wife, Marie-Claire. The album will feature 11 original songs by Zimmerman, as well as a cover of ‘Stay (I Want You To Stay)’ by Big Thief’s Adrianne Lenker. Zimmerman described the album to his label, Big Potato, in fittingly dreamy terms:

“The Little Prince by way of the pen of Antoine de Saint Exupéry said ‘Draw me a sheep’ and I said to the the Little Prince ‘Dream me a dream’ overheard by Nick HOO (Big Potato Nick) who said ‘Record me a song’ so I recorded a song and then one or two more and just like that whip crack away and snap dragon fingers we had an album and just like that pump up the jambalaya and kick the chandelier Nick’s got the tracks mixed and mastered and pressed into 12” discs that say hallelujah and great balls of fire on the cover and that’s all I’m going to say about the outer wheels of this wagon as it rolls into your life the inner clockworks too intricate and deep to make language suffer so if you want more go to the Little Prince ask him to draw you a Dream of Now and Memory…”

Holton spoke somewhat more literally of the album.

“Tucker told me ‘Rose of Sharon’ was about the dark side of the hippie movement in California,” Holton said in a press release. “Young girls being swept away with various cults. We really flew with this track. Recorded it with both of us on the synths. It edges towards the psychedelic, almost Krautyrock style. Jackie Oates does a wonderful job with her beautiful voice and violin. We recorded this in 2024 and then Tucker re-sung the vocals in 2025 when he was pretty frail. But the energy came through when the tape was rolling! It rocks.

“Tucker and I had long chats during the recording. And we went very deep on occasions focusing on love, fear, and the future. He mentioned he’d never recorded a cover version, but that his dear friend Annie (Adrianne Lenker) had written this wonderful song. It's called ‘Stay (Wanted You to Stay)’ and this version was for/to his love Marie-Claire.”

Of Marie-Claire, Zimmerman wrote: "Without her I would be nowhere in the world….Her love for me and her faith in what I do is beyond belief. She is my guide. She is my muse. She is my driver."

Dream Me A Dream is out in June.

Listen to ‘Sun In Scorpio’ now: