Music Industry News

Karl Sölve Steven is a composer and producer, currently based in Pārāwai (Thames) and Anna Fält is a Voice Artist & singing teacher originally from Finland, living in Sweden.

Steven’s output is a collage of organic and electronic sources, synthesised down into an ambitious and enigmatic sound. While working mainly with music to picture, Steven has also been a part of groups Queen Neptune, The Drab Doo-Riffs, Heart Attack Alley and Supergroove.

Anna Fält works widely within the culture branch, including theatre stages, art projects and various festivals and venues. Born & raised in Finland, living in Sweden, Anna combines the different voice traditions, languages and singing aesthetics to a unique combination of sounds.

Today Fält and Steven have announced V Ä V A, a new collaborative album and share the first offering ‘Ähky’.

‘Ähky’ bristles with rhythmic energy and life. Fält’s shuffled percussive handclaps and breath work give way to circular loops that Steven effects with granular processing.

“I originally wrote Ähky as a solo performance in 2015 and sometimes I sing it at my concerts.” says Fält. “It’s an old spell against stomach ache or colic, basically it’s a text that says to this ache to go away, just in a very poetic way with many words. Karl saw a video of me singing it live and asked if we could do something with it without knowing where it comes from. Parts of his family come from the Finn Forests and still live there!”

“‘Ähky’ and the V Ä V A project is definitely a special one for me,” says Steven. “It marks the first time in my musical journey that I’ve had the opportunity to explore my Swedish roots, in particular those of the Värmland/Finnskog regions where my Mother’s Mother’s family comes from and where my Uncle still lives (out in the forest in a house that has sheltered the family for multiple generations). The lake behind the house has been a touchstone throughout my life (there’s literally a stone which I touch whenever I visit!); I helped my Grandmother set up her loom (vävstol) there as a child, went ice-fishing with my uncle, and explored the forest (and picked berries and mushrooms!) with my Mother and family there many times.”

“Needless to say with this background I leapt at the opportunity to work with Anna Fält when we were introduced by our mutual friend, taonga pūoro artist Rob Thorne (Ngāti Tumutumu). We spent a day together at Roundhead Studios with a selection of microphones and modular synths, a traditional Swedish Nyckelharpa (made in the 1970’s by the painter Sven Persson), and a small harp (made from salvaged Rimu for my Wife’s Grandfather). We met again in a studio in Stockholm to record ‘Ähky’ and work through our already recorded material which had been so deftly prepared for us by engineer Matt Gunn.”

Fält notes “Rob had an intuition and told me to contact Karl because he just knew we would hit it off. Karl booked a studio, I flew and made a grand plan that literally sounded like this: ‘Let’s make Something!’. So Ähky and V Ä V A is our Something.”

Check out all things Karl Sölve Steven below:
Website
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Picture 1: Artwork for ‘Ähky’
Picture 2: Karl Sölve Steven | Photo Credit: Bysjön A
Picture 3: Anna Fält