Last spring, Ryan Thompson, accompanied by pianist Mark Johnson and guitarist Declan Harris, belted out jazz standards to students crowded into a small campus room one night. The trio was headlining UR’s inaugural Tiny Dorm Concert.

“We enjoy performing for anyone, whether it’s 1,000 people, 30 people, or 5 people,” said Thompson, a rising senior. The concert came together in a half-dozen practices over two weeks.

Conceived by leaders with the Modlin Arts Student Ambassadors, the series takes a twist on National Public Radio’s Tiny Desk Concerts. A former host launched that series after lamenting he never got close to artists during live shows and couldn’t hear over the crowd noise. Since 2008, the series has hosted headliners to up-and-coming musicians in every genre from a corner newsroom desk.

“We have so much talent on this campus, and we can incorporate the college experience in the intimacy of a dorm,” said Bell Tome, who scouted Thompson for the performance. “It seems so spontaneous to be having a concert in your living room or your bedroom.”

Tome, a psychology and health sciences major with an interest in videography, collaborated with recent graduate Ethan Swift to film and edit the first performance, now available on YouTube. They used a Go-Pro camera and equipment borrowed from the campus Technology Learning Center.

“The lack of space only helped us get more creative in how we filmed it,” she said. “As a videographer, I was working to capture how I perceived the music.”

In such a small venue, attendees could see each artist’s movement — something that often gets lost beyond the front rows of concert halls, she said.

When not in the neuroscience lab this summer with UR’s famous driving rats, she’s helping to edit the next Tiny Dorm Concert with R&B singer Kavya Borra, a recent graduate.

Meanwhile, Thompson is interning in Brooklyn, just south of his Westchester, N.Y., home, at Figure 8 Recording. He’s learning how to set up microphones and equipment, and mix sound and tracks, to best capture the sound the artist wants. A double major equally passionate about economics and music, Thompson aims to first explore singing and songwriting as a career.

His voice echoes that of Frank Sinatra, not surprising since he has listened to the singer since receiving a copy of the legend’s “Come Fly with Me” for Christmas when he was 11 or 12. For four years, Sinatra dominated Thompson’s Spotify most-played list.

The Tiny Dorm Concert is another tool to help the trio book other gigs. Thompson plans to use his developing studio connections to make additional recordings.

“Music is what I’m really into right now, and I want to pursue this while I have the time to fail,” he said, “instead of waiting for later, when I probably want to be doing something more stable.”