Songs from the islands

The Faroese singer and composer Eivør Pálsdóttir won her first singing competition on TV when she was 13, and has since won several awards in Denmark, Iceland as well as her homeland. Although Eivør’s musical roots spring from Faroese folk songs, she has visited genres such as jazz, rock, hymns, classical music, trip hop and pop throughout her career, resulting in a double-digit number of album releases. Growing up in a musical family, Eivør has described her parents as her first mentors; her mother singing all the time, and her father writing poems and short stories almost every day. Additionally, there was a lot of musical activity in the small town where she lived, which helped creating a foundation for her future career.

– I listen to all sorts of music depending on what mood I’m in, Eivør explains when being asked about her musical preferences in an interview with the Bergen International Festival:– I’m always curious to hear music that has got both edge and beauty at the same time, and recently I have been listening a lot to Sevdaliza and SOPHIE. I also frequently go back to old classics that touched my heart in the past, such as Nick Drake and Leonard Cohen.

– Is it correct to assume that your Faroese musical roots always can be heard in the songs you write, no matter what genre?

– Yes, I definitely think so. My curiosity about music started within Faroese traditional folk music, which is such a big part of the everyday life on the Islands where I grew up. Surrounded by the ocean, the untamed force of nature has always been one of my main sources of inspiration. The ever changing dark and the light, the harshness and the softness, is something that has always somehow found its way into my music. I see it as some sort of “core” of everything I create.

Today, Eivør - who sings in Faroese, Icelandic, Norwegian, Swedish, Danish and English - has fans all over the world, and her participation on the soundtracks for the film The Last Kingdom, the TV series Game Of Thrones and the video game God of War has helped increasing the singer’s popularity even more. Her vocal style has been described as ‘a light soprano voice that can break out in dramatic shouts and screams on stage’. Eivør is classically trained, and has starred in the Faroese opera performance Firra as well as played the title role in the chamber opera performance Marilyn Forever (about Marilyn Monroe), with music by the British composer Gavin Bryars. She has also performed at everything from the Roskilde Festival in Denmark to stages in Greenland and Canada. It feels obvious to ask if Eivør is a workaholic:

– Hahahaha….well, the short answer is YES. I have made nine solo albums and loads of side projects since I first started making music. And every time I finish something I tend to think “what’s next”?

– Can you tell us a little about what you are going to perform at the Bergen International Festival?

– I am going to perform songs from my new album SEGL which I am extremely excited about. Like most musicians, I haven’t played any gigs for a very long time and it’s going to be such a release to finally play these songs LIVE! I am also going to play some of my older songs of course, and I am bringing my band along as well!

– Most people in Norway like to think of the Faroe Islands as something a bit exotic, even though you are not really that far away from us. What do you see as the biggest cultural differences between the two countries?

– I actually think we have a lot in common, like that slightly dark humour. Biggest difference…hmmmm….maybe Faoese people tend to take it a little more “easy”, and generally they are not hiking and running around in the mountains that much, hahaha…

Supported by Vestland county council