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SUSANNA shares new single “Invitation To Voyage”- New album ‘Go Dig My Grave’ out this Friday, Feb 9th, via SusannaSonata

February 7, 2018

SUSANNA
– Shares new single “Invitation To Voyage”
– Announces new London show!
– Album ‘Go Dig My Grave’ due Feb 9th via SusannaSonata

Norwegian artist Susanna is sharing the last single from her new album Go Dig My Grave’ ahead of it’s release this Friday,Feb 9th. The new single, “Invitation To Voyage”, is a brand new composition from Susanna written to a poem from Charles Baudelaire’s once banned ‘Flowers of Evil’ banned in 19th century France for its treatment of decadence and eroticism.

With this piece, Susanna interprets Baudelaire’s words. Susanna explains: “Quite recently I started to read Baudelaire’s ‘Flowers of Evil’. I fell in love with the beautiful poems and got the urge to sing some of them. This one is the first of the songs I have written to this poetry, and a wonderful mysterious world has opened up to me. “Invitation to the Voyage” is a dream, or singing it feels like entering a dreamlike state of mind. I get a very strong sense of being in between worlds with the beautiful words of Baudelaire in this poem.”

With ‘Go Dig My Grave’, Susanna’s 12th album, she explores historic musical gaps by combining music from the Great American Songbook and old English traditionals with baroque instrumentation and her own, characteristic vocal interpretations. Add some Henry Purcell, some Lou Reed, and Susanna’s own composition, and the unique complexity of Susanna’s artistry is evident: ‘Go Dig My Grave’ is a profoundly personal collection of dark songs with deep roots through centuries of American and European musical heritage.

An unnerving combination of existential despair and musical beauty, ‘Go Dig My Grave’ presents a selection of songs straddling issues of lost love, abandonment – and a merciless thirst for liquor. Speaking about her new record, Susanna explains, “I am attracted to the sad songs, and how people have used music throughout the years; it feels like they use songs and singing as a way of processing and dealing with of the difficult times in their lives. There’s a lot of similarities in the dramatic ways of telling a story in the old English ballads such as ‘The Willow Song’ and ‘The Three Ravens’ and the American folk songs like ‘Go Dig My Grave’ – even if the newer folk songs has more of a straightforwardness to the tragedy.”

The album marks Susanna’s return to her collaboration with Swiss baroque harp player Giovanna Pessi. Pessi first appeared alongside Susanna on the album ‘Sonata Mix Dwarf Cosmos’, released on Rune Grammofon in 2007, and played a major role on the critically acclaimed ECM album ‘If Grief Could Wait’, a deep-dive into the sorrow-stricken music of Henry Purcell, Leonard Cohen and Susanna herself. This time the two have invited the talented young accordion player Ida Løvli Hidle and the great Norwegian fiddle player and folk singer Tuva LivsdaWer Syvertsen to form a quartet. The result is a dynamic band that easily masters subtle shifts from the simple folk feeling of songs like Elizabeth CoWen’s “Freight Train” to the icy beauty of Purcell’s “Cold Song” and the complex, centuries old lament of “The Willow Song”.

Produced by Deathprod and Susanna‘Go Dig My Grave’ was recorded at the world class Rainbow Studio in Oslo and is released on Susanna’s own label SusannaSonata.

Tour dates:
22nd March, Big Ears Festival, Knoxville (TN) USA (solo)
23rd March, Big Ears Festival, Knoxville (TN) USA (ft. Giovanna Pessi, Frode Haltli & Cheyenne Mize)
24th March,The Park Church Co-op, Brooklyn (NY) USA (ft. Giovanna Pessi, Frode Haltli & Cheyenne Mize)
25th May, Asker Kulturhus, Asker, Norway (ft. Giovanna Pessi, Ida Hidle & Tuva Syvertsen)
12th August, Norwegian Opera House, Tribute to Joni Mitchell, Oslo, Norway
27th September, Rich Mix, London, UK (ft. Giovanna Pessi, Frode Haltli & Sarah-Jane Summers)

‘Go Dig My Grave’ artwork:

‘Go Dig My Grave’ tracklist:
1. Freight Train (Elizabeth Cotten)
2. Cold Song (John Dryden/Henry Purcell)
3. Invitation to the Voyage (Charles Baudelaire/Susanna Wallumrød)
4. Rye Whiskey (Traditional)
5. The Willow Song (Anonymous)
6. Go Dig My Grave (Traditional)
7. Lilac Wine (James Shelton)
8. Wilderness (Ian Curtis, Peter Hook, Stephen Morris, Bernard Sumner)
9. The Three Ravens (Old English folk ballad)
10. Perfect Day (Lou Reed)

Links:
Susanna Facebook

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