Barely one year after the Rune Grammofon-release of critically-acclaimed Wild
Dog (SONATA 004LP), Susanna returns with a new album, released on her own
label SusannaSonata. Susanna is known for both her own songwriting, with songs
such as ''Believer'' and her huge range of highly personal interpretations of other
people's songs. She is an intensely arresting performer; holding audiences captive
with her hypnotizing vocal timbre and the powerful, all-consuming sound of her
band, her concerts are truly magical. Active for more than a decade, through eight
albums so far as Susanna And The Magical
Orchestra/Susanna/Susanna Wallumrod, the Oslo-based artist has
recently been taking great steps towards greater independence and autonomy,
while increasing the range of her considerable talents as a songwriter, vocal
interpreter and producer. Combining the antique notes of the Baroque theorbo,
woodwinds and strings, and Susanna's sparse piano, The Forester -- a coproduction
with the Norwegian Ensemble neoN -- features Susanna's strongest
songwriting to date. The Forester began to take shape when composers Julian
Skar and Jan Martin Smordal requested some material from her to arrange
for the Norwegian contemporary music group Ensemble neoN. Picking from new
tracks and several already released songs, the composers made new
arrangements suited to the eight-piece group, and extended the title-track into a
15-minute, three-part suite in which dark woods shroud a wanderer in a symbolic
landscape of searching and loss. Being lost, or deliberately straying from the
chosen path, are recurring themes on The Forester, whose subject matter ranges
from disturbing natural environments to alien visitors, painted on an eerily
exquisite canvas that recalls Mark Hollis, Tim Buckley, Kate Bush and
Claude Debussy, while remaining uniquely Susanna's soundworld. Recorded
entirely live in one single, emotionally-intense day at Oslo's legendary Rainbow
Studio, produced by Deathprod and Susanna and engineered by Jan Erik
Kongshaug.
TRACKLISTING
01. The Forester I, II & III
02. Hangout
03. Oh, I Am Stuck
04. Intruder
05. Lonely Heart