Record reviews

Avant Joik: Live in Bergen reviews (in English and Chilean)

Loop: Avant Joik is the collaborative project of Norwegian Maja S. K. Ratkje on vocals and live electronics, Swedish Katarina Barruk on vocals and joik, and Finn Matti Aikio on live visuals. At first I thought that joik was an instrument, although Barruk uses it as such through the type of singing it is. The

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Works for String Orchestra, other reviews in Norwegian

Ukens anbefaling (Spellemann spesial): Maja S.K. Ratkje – Works for String Orchestra av Ola Nordahl 13.02.21, Musikkskriverier Det pågår noe så sjeldent som en liten estetisk debatt (eller krangel om du vil) i det norske samtidsmusikkmiljøet for tiden. (…) I anmeldelsen lar Emil Bernhardt det tydelig komme fram at plata stryker ham mothårs, og han

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Corona lockdown concert for TUSK Festival 2020 reviewed in TQ Zine

by Rory Carr, TQ38/39/40, a TUSK Virtual special triple issue, published Jan 2021 “There’s a clichéd joke about watching live electronic music shows which says you might as well be watching someone read their emails. The physical gestures required to make music with laptops and other digital devices are the same as those for office

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Works for String Orchestra reviewed by Dagens Nyheter (SE)

5/5 (…) I händerna på denna stråkorkester blir det en allvarsam lek där det destruktiva – verket är inspirerat av såväl myten om Atlantis, översvämningarna i Venedig och den rådande klimatkrisen – är en förutsätting för det konstruktiva. En mirakulös musik som tjuraktigt stångar sig igenom vår tids dystopier och pessimism. Bästa spår: hela albumet.”

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Echo Chamber 3.0 reviewed by The Wire and The Free Jazz Collective

Julian Cowley, The Wire: Echochamber is all about what it means to have a voice, metaphorically as well as physically,” explains Maja Ratkje at the outset. Composing this intricate work she interviewed members of Trondheim Voices, and made exact transcriptions to serve as spoken text. The all-female ensemble weave a choral continuum from an astonishing

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Rum Music: The Best Of 2016 With Russell Cuzner at The Quietus

It was another prolific year for Maja Ratkje, the polymathic Norwegian artist, that saw the release of several albums from And Sing’s matching of her extraordinary vocals with contemporary classical ensembles, through a collaboration with the modern jazz band Poing, to an album commemorating the 20th anniversary of Spunk, the notoriously experimental quartet she forms

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Still Eating Ginger Bread for Breakfast reviews (in English, Norwegian, German)

Boomkat: Pre-eminent free improv unit SPUNK offer a feast of uncanny, otherworldly sound in Still Eating Gingerbread For Breakfast, which is a recording of both sets from their 20th anniversary concert at Nasjonal Jazzscene in Oslo, December 2015. It forms their 9th album together, and evidently demonstrates that Maja S.K. Ratkje, Hild Sofie Tafjord, Kristin

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Crepuscular Hour reviewed by Nieuwe Noten (NL)

De Noorse componiste en elektronica producer Maja Solveig Kjelstrup Ratkje schreef ‘Crepuscular Hour’ in 2010 in opdracht van het Ultima Festival in Oslo. Het werk heeft een markante bezetting, bestaande uit drie koren, drie instrumentalisten – gitaar, tenorsaxofoon en hoorn, die bedieners van elektronica en een kerkorgel. In 2012 beleefde het stuk zijn tweede en

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Crepuscular Hour reviewed by Ondarock (IT)

Delle due rappresentazioni dell’oratorio di un’ora scarsa “Crepuscular Hour” – la prima è avvenuta nella sua Oslo nel 2010 – la norvegese Maja Solveig Kjelstrup Ratkje (classe 1973) ha scelto, per l’incisione su disco, la seconda in Uk del 2012, anche trasmessa via broadcast. Il nuovo missaggio evidenzia l’adozione, non ultimo simbolica, del numero tre:

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