In The Country, Solveig Slettahjell, Knut Reiersrud - Remembrance (2025)

The collaboration between In the Country, Solveig Slettahjell and Knut Reiersrud is a musical stroke of luck.

They assembled for a concert at the Berlin Philharmonic in 2014, which resulted in the Spellemann-nominated live album "Norwegian Woods". The following year, the studio album "Trail Of Souls" was released and now, finally, a new release: "Remembrance". Here, Solveig Slettahjell has curated a selection of poems by Emily Brontë, Charlotte Brontë, and Emily Dickinson, which Morten Qvenild has set to music.

The music was also recorded in Qvenild's studio Ugla Lyd over a period of two years.

Almost 200 years ago, the three English sisters Emily, Charlotte, and Anne Brontë, and the American, Emily Dickinson, wrote on each side of the Atlantic. We now count these poets among the greatest poets in history, but, because they were women, their large production was never published under their own names during their lifetimes. It has therefore been powerful to see how, regardless of these circumstances, they still know about each other and, in one of the poems, also write about each other. These poets lived in a time when life was fragile and grief was a familiar companion for many. The Brontë sisters all died early from what is believed to have been tuberculosis. The lyrics are characterized by recognition and loss, but also by hope and the will to live.

Songwriter Morten Qvenild has put these lyrics in a beautiful and deep dialogue with the music. This dialogue takes on a deeper dimension when two of our leading vocalists, Solveig Slettahjell and Sidsel Endresen, are voices in the project. Qvenild has composed grounded songs with a modern expression and has ingeniously connected and contrasted lyrics and music. With Reiersrud, Arntzen and Hausken on the team, this comes together into a very unique whole, where the music consistently reflects a deep connection with the relationship-based lyrics of Brontë and Dickinson.

Tracklist
01 - This Is My Letter to the World
02 - To the Bluebell (Fall, Leaves, Fall)
03 - Remembrance
04 - Parting
05 - She Dried Her Tears
06 - The Night Is Darkening
07 - The Night-Wind
08 - Charlotte Bronte's Grave
09 - Waiting