An extraordinary woman, as well as a great musician: 16 albums in a 20-year career. And apparently, no desire—or need—to stop. Quite the opposite. This new album is decidedly in anything but a casual or minor key. Despite the unarguable crisis in the buying of non-digital formats in Scandinavia, Nyberg has created an object that really must be held in your hands, read, caressed. Without question, a double CD to be purchased, with its powerful graphics and artistry, thanks also to the photos by Miki Anaguris and illustrations by Matilda Ruta—a concept album that has much to say about the musical and almost metaphysical ability of one of the most important voices in the illustrious Scandinavian panorama.

Two sumptuous, ambitious CDs for the “sirenades”, some parts more Dionysian and some more Apollonian, from tenderness to abyss, held together with a tone that is unyielding and alive, allowing movement from grandiose Broadway to free jazz, passing through just about everything, from existential melancholy to Afro-Cuban jazz. Its pop equivalent would be the Divine Comedy. From the disquieting tenderness of the mermaids (Sirens, the first CD), we move to the Monsters of the second, and in the 13 tracks of this double album, Lina Nyberg truly puts her voice to the test, taking on songs in which she makes her vocal talents shine (in a couple of songs she’s perhaps not coarse enough to be as “bad” as she would like − but it’s a detail). In any case, beyond her abundant talents as a singer and composer, Nyberg also projects a great emotionality, an internal pathos, an urgency to communicate and to speak, almost to “exist”. And she does it without ever being fragile.
The arrangement is accomplished and highly balanced; no instrument is dominant, not even the vocal. In fact, equilibrium prevails, like a perfect rice salad where some ingredients remain in your mouth for a few seconds, and you savor them, but what prevails is the overall flavor. Nor does she force the presence of the fabulous Norrbotten Big Band, composed of tremendous soloists such as Karl-Martin Almqvist, who has a tenor sax solo on The Sirenade, and Håkan Broström, with an alto sax solo on The Monster. The soloists in the lineup (Cecilia Persson on piano, David Stackenäs on guitars, Josef Kallerdahl on bass and Peter Danemo on drums) are perfect in their roles, and chosen to create an excellent mix. Danemo is one of Scandinavia’s best drummers but also, in fact, one of its best composers − I will cover him soon in a separate review. For now, I would like to remark that for this record he has created a splendid arrangement of Lilac Wine. The tracks on this album are continually transforming, contradicting themselves, defying any definition. The listener had better not become too attached to a genre: the album doesn’t really belong on just one shelf.

The first CD opens with One Tone Song, a very articulate track that starts off with very interesting guitar played by David Stackenäs with an EBow, which then, however, immediately dissolves into a filmic arrangement with some Cuban echoes, plunging into a crescendo of dissonance in which Lina plays with her voice, until the arrival of new guitar − this time progressive to the point of being acid − over which double bass and drums chase each other frenetically, with everything dissolving once again in the finale, which again picks up the filmic cadence, and where the voice returns open and calm.
A similar arrangement for The Cyber Song, where the content of the lyrics is brought to the fore: our social interaction has become inhibited by our virtual interaction, which in its hyperpresence has become more detached and remote in reality. The track slowly becomes subdued, until all that’s left in the light is the intense, minimal line of Cecilia Persson’s piano (one of very few women jazz musicians even in the very egalitarian Sweden), which regrows until taking up the initial theme again.
As already mentioned, Lilac Wine is backed by Peter Danemo’s splendid arrangement, for one of Nyberg’s best vocal interpretations on this album.
In The Monster Song, the Norrbotten Big Band can be appreciated to the full through an opening resounding arrangement of 1970s music scores that then takes on a Broadway musical sound, until bringing to the surface the magnificent sax of Håkan Broström, in duet with the double bass of Josef Kallerdahl, intermezzoed by a delicious little chorus that, melodically speaking, is one of the juiciest things on the album, before returning to the Big Band with its musical sounds for closing.
After an attack that is even more cinematic, we become more anchored to a sinuously Cuban groove for much of the title track, The Sirenade, where the sax of Karl-Martin Almqvist can be appreciated at its best.
The same track that closes the first CD then opens the second − Who Shall Measure − whose title is taken from the beginning of one of the most well-known quotes by Virginia Woolf, from A Room of One’s Own: “Who shall measure the heat and violence of a poet’s heart when caught and tangled in a woman’s body?”. This version is fully orchestral, symphonic and very brief; it almost serves just to give a taste of the CD that follows, which opens with this same track in a chamber music dimension that is freer in a way. It’s probably all a matter of my own personal interpretation, but I have the feeling Nyberg wanted to give such a strong tone to her vocal interpretation as a small “vindication” of her own womanhood, showing some talons regarding her artistic being in a male-dominated world. The vocal play continues brilliantly in the following track, The Skin, where listening to her play with the notes is a resounding experience, perhaps the best track of the double album in this respect.
The third track (The Monster Song) is also a reprise from the first CD but in a simplified version where the voice once again emerges with more color in a timber that’s more like Nina Simone, and enriched − a trite term, but used here with true conviction − by the splendid guitar of Stackenäs, again with the irresistible final little chorus and the closing by Norrbotten.
In The Song of the Roses, Nyberg again plays with the great richness of her voice in a modulation that is “fatter” and richer with harmonics, where she is perfectly at ease, with a minimal accompaniment, all introduced by a tasty double bass solo.
The fifth track, The Woodlouse, has a Beatlesque motif, and is it followed by I Write −this too has a pop rock motif, with the powerful double bass of Kallerdahl played with a bow and paired with Danemo’s fantastical brush play.
The second CD closes with a ballad by Caetano Veloso (a composer much frequented by Nyberg) with an almost folk flavor, London London, where her voice plays a lot on the richness of the alto and where her interpretation talents can be truly appreciated.

Congratulations Lina: this is a robust, ambitious, manifold, spectacular, coherent project: how difficult was it to conceive?
THANK YOU, it was exciting to read your thoughts. The creativity is not an issue to me but the practical parts always are… I´m still most happy that I managed to organize everything. From distributing the music to the musicians, rehearsing the music, recording and mixing it … It´s a long way to go with a lot of practical obstacles to avoid. So I feel more like a marathoner.

Is there something in my review that you feel you want to comment on?
I often have these monumental, intellectual and (perhaps too) ambitious thoughts behind my music. Quite seldom anyone notices or cares about it. It´s somehow part of the easygoing jazz-genre. I´m quite content you did.

You have indicated your respect and appreciation for Italian singer Maria Pia De Vito. Have you ever thought of a joint project with her?
I´d love to! She´s one of my favourite musicians.

Where does your next musical desire lead you? Or any other desire, for that matter? 🙂
I have no idea… I try not to think about it since after a project of this size I often need some time off writing music and creativity. 🙂

“The Sirenades”, Lina Nyberg, Hoob Records/Border, 2014

CD 1- Sirens:

1. One Tone Song
2. The Cyber Song
3. Lilac Wine
4. The Monster Song
5. The Sirenade
6. Who Shall Measure

CD 2 – Monsters:

1. Who Shall Measure
2. The Skin
3. The Monster Song
4. The Song of the Roses
5. The Woodlouse
6. I Write
7. London London

Lina Nyberg: voice
Cecilia Persson: piano
David Stackenäs: guitars
Josef Kallerdahl: bass
Peter Danemo: drums

Norrbotten Big Band: Bo Strandberg: trumpet; Magnus Ekholm: trumpet; Dan Johansson: trumpet; Jaçek Onuszkiewicz: trumpet; Peter Dahlgren: trombone; Christine Carlsson: trombone; Arvid Ingberg: trombone; Björn Hängsel: trombone; Håkan Broström: saxophone; Jan Thelin: saxophone; Mats Garberg: saxophone; Karl-Martin Almqvist: saxophone; Per Moberg: saxophone.