Album Review: Ane Brun, Live At Berwaldhallen

Recorded last year at the Stockholm venue with the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, plus a trio consisting of keyboards, percussion and vocal assistant, Live At Berwaldhallen features 16 tracks. There’s the Norwegian Brun’s unique interpretations of a Shakespeare sonnet and a Monteverdi piece, as well as covers of tracks by Beyoncé and Bjork – two artists not often mentioned in the same breath, but who are adapted to fit into Brun’s live agenda.

The brooding/pleading ‘The Opening’ sets the somewhat sombre mood in a musical environment that allows Brun a little reinvention of her own, as she plumbs the nether regions of despair with her expressive voice. This applies especially to the half-spoken ‘To Let Myself Go’ and to ‘Undertow’, in which the arrangements achieve a delicacy to match Brun’s vocal. The feisty Middle Eastern-tinged jaggedness of ‘Shape Of A Heart’ has echoes of Kate Bush, but it struggles towards the sense of fulfilment she achieved on her studio version.

‘Lamento della Ninfa (The Nymph’s Lament)’, meanwhile, gets the full Monteverdi treatment in English after a captivating piano intro. Beyoncé’s ‘Halo’ can seem a bit too polite in such forward company, but Brun gives Björk’s ‘Joga’ an emotional warmth a bit lacking in the the original. She reaches peak Brun with ‘Directions’, driven by heavyweight percussion, with her voice sounding perfect for conductor Hans Ek’s orchestral setting.

There’s a captivating fragility to Brun’s vocals that convinces the listener she’s lived in these songs forever, and is still enthralled by what she finds there. With this album, she proves she brooks no limits to her musical palette, but is happy to explore fresh textures. I suspect it’s that sense of adventure that draws her fans back time and time again.

8.5/10