Karl Bjorå Ensemble

Karl Bjorå, guitar and compositions
Selma French, Hardanger Fiddle, Violin and Voice
Tuva Syvertsen, Hardanger Fiddle, Violin and Voice
Vegard Lien Bjerkan, Piano and Synthesizer
Bárður R. Poulsen, Bass
Andreas Winther, Drums

Karl Bjorå Ensemble is the band of Evje-born guitar player and composer Karl Bjorå.

The musical textures are distinct, almost tactile in their clarity, weaving together elements of jazz and ambient improvisation with accents of Americana, Nordic folk, whispers of rock and post-rock, fleeting glimpses of classicism, and even echoes of hymnal reverence. The instrumentation creates a consistently organic feeling, as though the music has spontaneously grown from a crack in a stone or atop still waters. Even the choices of synthesiser sounds, for example, adhere to the overall resinous, woody and reedy sound.

Experimental aspects are embedded deeply within the fabric of the compositions, so fully integrated that they appear as the only means by which the music could have been created. At no point is the musicality sacrificed on an altar of showmanship, but instead these less conventional techniques and sounds become powerful catalysts for expression and improvisational direction. The compositions effortlessly duck and weave, and ebb and flow through their respective soundscapes, alternating between rhythmic and harmonic complexity and simplicity as required. Each piece has its own drama to unfold, its own character, its own personal dogma. Swells and crescendos, brisk transitions between grandeur and quiet humility, dense atmospheres open from, or into, airy open spaces. Tensions build and release. Indeed, the "whimsical" of the title track points to the unifying principles of mercurial exploration, capricious invention, and endless destabilization of expectation that govern the whole project. The album feels like a fully-formed whole, where the disparity of sounds, the various rhythms, the multiple approaches to harmonic development, the structural evolutions and improvisations all coalesce into a uniquely identifiable singular form. It is an album that is courting the notion of its very own genre.