Home » Jazz Articles » Album Review » Lina Nyberg: Anniverse

5

Lina Nyberg: Anniverse

By

View read count
Lina Nyberg: Anniverse
Vocalist Lina Nyberg takes us through a calendar year with her album Anniverse. Being Swedish, we're talking northern hemisphere when she sings of January and following footsteps in the snow with the sun only barely appearing on the horizon. Dark but not dispirited she intones rising hopes. This recording began with Nyberg's call to her long time collaborators pianist Cecilia Persson, guitarist David Stackenäs, bassist Josef Kallerdahl, and drummer Peter Danemo to send her ten words they associated with a specific month. She then wrote lyrics and returned then to the musicians to compose music.

Akin to a journal, the eleven tracks (February and March are squeezed into one) follow the calendar year, from dark to light to dark again and from cold to hot and back again. A calendar year is a perfect vehicle for Nyberg to display her range, which takes in jazz, classical, stage, and improvisational song. From "Januari" we parade into "The February March" and the earth's great transformation. Nyberg's beautiful incantations over Danemo's marching pulse summon the hopes of spring even as winter maintains its cold grip. Onward to Vernon Duke and Yip Harburg's classic "April In Paris," which is delivered as an urban field recording with hesitant vocals. Nyberg's delivery of the now famous lyrics is both sure yet apprehensive. Spring equals love and love equals spring. "Maj" finds Schumann's "May, Sweet May" reimagined as the stirring of all earthly things growing towards the sun. Nyberg's semi-classical rendering beseech the creator to push up the shoots.

The months pass with a gentle beauty. "June" and "Julian" are both devastatingly exquisite and a prelude to the collision of land and sea of "August." The highlight here might be David Stackenäs' reworking and arrangement of the 1978 Earth, Wind, & Fire pop hit "September." The ensemble takes it at an unhurried pace that reinterprets E,W&F's "Ba-du-da" in a fresh new light. "The October Storm" plays off of Broadway, "November" delivers divine wordless scat, and "Dear December" ends the year in preparation for the cold and dark once more. One more trip around the sun.

Track Listing

Januari; The February March; April In Paris; Maj; June; Julian; August; September; The October Storm; November; Dear December.

Personnel

Additional Instrumentation

Peter Danemo: electronics.

Album information

Title: Anniverse | Year Released: 2022 | Record Label: Hoob Records

Tags

Comments


PREVIOUS / NEXT




Support All About Jazz

Get the Jazz Near You newsletter All About Jazz has been a pillar of jazz since 1995, championing it as an art form and, more importantly, supporting the musicians who make it. Our enduring commitment has made "AAJ" one of the most culturally important websites of its kind, read by hundreds of thousands of fans, musicians and industry figures every month.

Go Ad Free!

To maintain our platform while developing new means to foster jazz discovery and connectivity, we need your help. You can become a sustaining member for as little as $20 and in return, we'll immediately hide those pesky ads plus provide access to future articles for a full year. This winning combination vastly improves your AAJ experience and allow us to vigorously build on the pioneering work we first started in 1995. So enjoy an ad-free AAJ experience and help us remain a positive beacon for jazz by making a donation today.

More

Eternal Moments
Yoko Yates
From "The Hellhole"
Marshall Crenshaw
Tramonto
John Taylor

Popular

Old Home/New Home
The Brian Martin Big Band
My Ideal
Sam Dillon
Ecliptic
Shifa شفاء - Rachel Musson, Pat Thomas, Mark Sanders
Lado B Brazilian Project 2
Catina DeLuna & Otmaro Ruíz

Get more of a good thing!

Our weekly newsletter highlights our top stories, our special offers, and upcoming jazz events near you.

Install All About Jazz

iOS Instructions:

To install this app, follow these steps:

All About Jazz would like to send you notifications

Notifications include timely alerts to content of interest, such as articles, reviews, new features, and more. These can be configured in Settings.