Silje Nergaard - At First Light

180-gram gatefold LP reissue, pressed by Pallas in Germany

First ever release on vinyl!

The Norwegian jazz vocalist and songwriter Silje Nergaard's At First Light (2001) is the best-selling Norwegian jazz album ever, and entered the official sales chart in Norway at no. 1 in its first week. "Silje's voice is as childlike as Lisa Ekdahl's, and as if that wasn't enough she has a baby on backing vocals! Her songwriting, though, is mature. She can write an expansive melody that's well structured but isn't straitjacketed by chorus and verse.

"'Be Still My Heart' comes from the Sting school of navel-gazing, with its falling cadences, rich bass, and Till Bronner's haunting, Chris Botti-esque trumpet. This, and the quietly beautiful 'There's Always a First Time,' both start with simple melody and instrumentation and grow in complexity. Silje's polished-silver vocals mix with sax and strings to form a precious but strong amalgam, while Magnus Lindgren's sax solo unravels the melody and plays with the loose ends.

"Although Silje writes her music at a distance from lyricist Mike McGurk, the produce of their relationship sounds organic as if words and music developed together. In fact, Silje sees the nature of Scandinavian jazz in the need to try to let the melody breathe and it's this sense of space that her voice demands if it's to be at its most individual and expressive." — BBC