Archive for November, 2013

Morten to perform at Spellemann Awards

Morten at the 2010 Spellemann Awards

Morten at the 2010 Spellemann Awards.

Morten will be premiering a new single called “Brother” at the 2013 Spellemann Awards (Norwegian Grammies) on January 18th, the official site announced today. The song, which is from his upcoming solo album, has been written by Morten, Ole Sverre Olsen and Peter Kvint.

This might indicate that “There is a Place” is a one-off single in connection with Night of the Proms, rather than an album track. Hard to say, as there’s been no official info about it yet.

“The album will be finished in December and is probably released in March. Then there’s a European tour in May, Norwegian and international festivals during the summer and even more touring in the fall”, manager Harald Wiik tells VG in connection with the Spellemann announcement.

The Spellemann show is held in Stavanger Konserthus and will be broadcast live on NRK1. Other acts scheduled to perform include Ask Embla, CLMD, Envy, Highasakite and Kvelertak.

New single from Morten

Single cover

Single cover

A new single from Morten called “There is a Place”, presumably the first single off his upcoming solo album, will be available this coming week, according to the Norwegian streaming service WiMP.

The single will be released on November 29th, the same day Morten starts his 18-date Night Of The Proms tour in Germany and Luxembourg.

“There is a Place” has a length of 3:14 minutes and is released through Morten’s own company Compass Point.

Update: 7digital.com now has a 1-minute preview of the song here.

News about Morten’s 2014 solo tour has also started to appear this week. Two dates have been announced; l’Olympia in Paris on May 14th (ticket info on the official site) and London on May 16th (venue and ticket info TBA).

Magne interviewed on The Briefing

Magne in London earlier this year (Picture from Dagbladet)

Magne in London earlier this year
(Picture from Dagbladet)

Monocle.com’s radio talkshow The Briefing is doing a special Nordic edition this week. Yesterday the show was broadcast live from Oslo, and Magne was one of the guests.

The interview with Magne was done in London however, as he was there to do some work. The conversation with Tom Edwards touched on Norwegian cultural politics, Magne’s visual arts and the music he’s doing for the upcoming Beatles movie:

“Musically, right now I’m deep into a film score for a film called ‘Beatles’. I think it’s gonna be called ‘Yesterday’ over here. It’s actually the first time that The Beatles have allowed original material to this degree. There’s three full Beatle recordings in the score, and I’m supposed to write original music that can stand up to that. That’s a bit of a challenge (laughs).

On the other hand, if I look at it differently this is a return to my own childhood. This is the music I grew up listening to, which inspired me to go out and make my mark on whatever world stage. It’s a little bit about returning to that feeling of growing up in a sort of a provincial place in the 1970s, where you had one hour of pop music on the radio every day. Kids today can’t even relate to that, but that’s what it was like.

I’ve sort of gone into a method around it that allows me to now go into Abbey Road – I’ve gotten hold of the “Lady Madonna” piano and the mics that they used and the recording equipment they used – and to set it up as a kind of authentic setting to recreate, not the music of The Beatles, but that zeitgeist, that time period.”

The whole interview can be heard here (starts at 45 minutes).

Morten attends funeral of Lage Fosheim

Morten outside Uranienborg church, November 12th

Morten outside Uranienborg church, November 12th

Morten attended the funeral of The Monroes vocalist Lage Fosheim (1958 – 2013) in Oslo today, together with a-ha manager Harald Wiik. Other musicians present included Sissel Kyrkjebø, Espen Lind and a-ha touring musician Dag Kolsrud.

Lage Fosheim and Eivind Rølles formed The Monroes in 1982, which quickly became the biggest band in Norway – until a-ha had their breakthrough. Their first two albums spawned the no. 1 hits Sunday People (1983) and Cheerio (1985).

Fosheim later became head of promotion at Universal Norway and worked with a-ha and Morten on various projects.

The Monroes: Eivind Rølles and Lage Fosheim

The Monroes: Eivind Rølles and Lage Fosheim

“This is sad and very unexpected. Lage was an unusually lively character. He’s been a central part of the Norwegian music scene since we started out. a-ha and The Monroes did many of the same things and cleared a path [for Norwegian pop music] in different areas”, Morten told VG before the ceremony.

“Lage was an extraordinary guy, with a unique level of energy. He made a difference in the way he was, not least how he embraced each day. His death came very sudden for all of us who didn’t know he was ill”, Morten added to Her og Nå.

Both members of The Monroes died of cancer this year, Rølles in March and Fosheim in October.

Articles about the funeral:  Dagbladet    VG    NRK    Her og Nå    VG photo gallery

Stolper + Friends gallery to close next month

Magne in front of the gallery

Magne in front of the gallery

Stolper + Friends, the Oslo art gallery that Magne co-owns together with Paul Stolper and Hugo Opdal, is set to close its doors by the end of the year.

“Our owners have ongoing projects all over the world, and we have decided to close down the gallery. The company will continue, but we will instead focus on so-called “pop-up” exhibitions around Oslo”, daily manager Kate Smith tells Dagens Næringsliv’s paper edition.

The gallery opened in September 2011 and has featured artists such as Peter Blake and Damien Hirst, in addition to Magne’s own projects. His Norwegian Wood sales exhibition, which ended this past weekend, was almost completely sold out.

“Our exhibitions have been successfull, but our rental agreement at Tjuvholmen ends in December, so we decided to close down”, Smith says.

The gallery’s last exhibition will be Art Under Pressure (8 Nov. – 22 Dec.), a smaller version of the Atelje Larsen group exhibtion which was held in Helsingborg, Sweden two years ago. Magne and Apparatjik are among the artists represented.

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