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Written in fRoots issue 275, 2006
 

KARI BREMNES
Over En By
Kirkelig Kulturverksted FXCD 293 (2005)

SOFIA KARLSSON
Svarta Ballader
Amigo AMCD 756 D (2005)

There’s a very Norwegian area of music that has no real parallel in Britain, a sort of chanson which encompasses new songs, settings of lyrics by Norwegian poets and influences from tradition, delivered by singers and musicians who move between jazz, deep tradition and popular music.
      One of its prime exponents is Kari Bremnes, who has been making beautiful albums for a quarter century, initially with her brother Ola and since 1987 solo, and she shows no sign of decline or even ageing. She has a serenely articulate voice reminiscent of Judy Collins’ early work.
      Her musicians are always the cream, including here among others guitarist Knut Reiersrud, bassist Bjørn Kjellemyr, trumpeter Arve Henriksen, violinist Nils Økland and drummer Helge Norbakken, all contributing to a finely suppressed strength and elegance in a set of her own lyrics to melodies mainly her own plus a couple each by her brothers Ola and Lars. All in Norwegian, naturally; she did recently release an album of some of her best known songs in English, and performed them in a rare British show at St Martin in the Fields in December 2004, but there’s great attractiveness even for a non-speaker in her delivery of her first language.

      Swedish singer Sofia Karlsson, who between 1998 and 2002 sang with Groupa bringing yet another dimension to that pioneering band, has for her second solo album taken a path that puts her alongside the Norwegian chansonniers and Bremnes in particular.
      The lyrics in Svarta Ballader are by one of Sweden’s best-known poets, Dan Andersson Many of them have become songs over the years since his death in 1920; others are set for the first time, mainly by Sofie Livebrant, who guests on piano; Thorstein Bergman, a veteran setter of Andersson lyrics including two here, also guests in a duet vocal. The varied and subtle arrangements feature a choice team varying from track to track including Esbjörn Hazelius on bowed and fretted strings and a duet vocal, Ale Möller on mandola, harmonica and accordion, Sebastian Notini’s percussion, with bass clarinet, bandoneon, trumpet, pedal steel, bass, and singers Sara Isaksson and Lena Willemark. The latter two join Karlsson in an acapella trio rendition of one of the songs for which Andersson himself made the music, Till Min Syster. The overall feel is, like Bremnes’s album, one of beautifully judged flow and characterful musicianship perfectly supporting the quiet passion of Karlsson’s singing.


© 2006 Andrew Cronshaw



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