Kirsten Braten Berg & Ale Moller, Lakki Patey, Bukkene Bruse Northern Nights: Music from the Top of the World Genres:International Music, New Age, Pop The Scandanavian music on Northern Nights is difficult to characterize: elements of Celtic, folk, Russian, and New Age all flow together for exotic, stunningly beautiful music. With a selection of songs from such premiere ... more »artists as Kirsten Bråten Berg and Hedningarna vocalist Kurki-Suonio, the collection radiates a dark, icy melancholy created from gentle guitar, violin, synth, and voice. Every song carries its own unique ambience, but Hege Rimestad's "Krishna's Cousin" typifies the lovely sound found throughout the album. With fretless bass, aching fiddle, deep drums, and floating vocals, "Cousin" rings softly, reminding one of an Icelandic Loreena McKennitt. In contrast, "Hilddá Luohti" has a touch of Asia in its delicate Yungchen Lhamo-esque vocals and gamelan-like sounds. --Karen Karleski« less
The Scandanavian music on Northern Nights is difficult to characterize: elements of Celtic, folk, Russian, and New Age all flow together for exotic, stunningly beautiful music. With a selection of songs from such premiere artists as Kirsten Bråten Berg and Hedningarna vocalist Kurki-Suonio, the collection radiates a dark, icy melancholy created from gentle guitar, violin, synth, and voice. Every song carries its own unique ambience, but Hege Rimestad's "Krishna's Cousin" typifies the lovely sound found throughout the album. With fretless bass, aching fiddle, deep drums, and floating vocals, "Cousin" rings softly, reminding one of an Icelandic Loreena McKennitt. In contrast, "Hilddá Luohti" has a touch of Asia in its delicate Yungchen Lhamo-esque vocals and gamelan-like sounds. --Karen Karleski
"I bought this CD for myself and then I took a long trip to Oslo and Finland and brought it along. We had a birthday party for me in Oslo and it was all guys, just by accident. They were playing this hard-driving electronic music, as guys are prone to do and I said to my sweetie, I can't take it: it's my party, let's put on that Northern Nights CD. So we did and everyone calmed down and started conversing in a civilized manner and they were impressed by this music from their own damn lands and trying to figure out the dialects in the lyrics and so on. What a great experience for me and everyone else, too. The music isn't just traditional; it's modern and beautiful and comes from a place deep in the roots of the landscape and culture"
Good exposure to Nordic Music
chefdevergue | Spokane, WA United States | 04/19/2003
(4 out of 5 stars)
"A lot of people might describe this CD as "mood music" or New Age, which would be enough to send me running in the opposite direction. I prefer to describe it as a good anthology of contemporary Nordic music, reflecting some traditional elements. If you want to relax and bliss out to this CD you should have no problem, but if you enjoy complex, sophisticated music, you also will find this to be a most satisfying CD.My only quibble is a complete lack of liner notes. However, the CD does provide the various albums that these tracks came from, in case you want to hear more of a particular artist's music. Every track can be found on other CDs.If you are not familiar with many Nordic artists, then this will be a very useful CD to give you some exposure!"
Some haunting tracks.
chefdevergue | 11/06/1999
(4 out of 5 stars)
"Some haunting tracks. Spoiled (for me) slightly by some rather extreme vocals."
You can feel the aurora in the music
chefdevergue | 07/23/1999
(5 out of 5 stars)
"Fantastic compilation of Scandinavian Artists music. Melodic and hypnotic. Very tranquil yet musically involving and very interesting to listen to. Try it!!!"