Norwegian singer Solveig Slettahjell began her career on ACT before signing to Universal. Now she is back in the fold for a gospel/blues album in the company of some fellow countrymen - guitarist Knut Reiersrud (also on harmonica) and avant jazz / indie combo In The Country. Slettahjell's interpretive skills are finely honed and her sedate, seductive delivery proves entirely sympathetic to the source material on this sparse, intimate recording.
Tracklist:
1. Borrowed time
2. Grandma's hands
3. Mercy street
4. Sometimes I feel like a motherless child
5. Come healing
6. Is my living in vain
7. Holy Joe
8. Trouble in mind
9. His eye is on the sparrow
10. I don't feel noways tired
11. Soul of a man

Reviews:
Rezension
Norwegian star Solveig Slettahjell, a vocalist with an uncanny gift for singing in a luminous whisper, began shifting from moody Nordic music toward an earthier American sound five years ago, and this session, which blues guitarist and harmonica player Knut Reiersrud guests on, retains that atmosphere . It also reunites Slettahjell with Morten Qvenild, the pianist from her early Slow Motion ensembles. The result is a fascinating conjunction of Slow Motion s attention to fine sonic detail at slow tempos and the directness of confessional classics including Trouble in Mind and Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child. Slettahjell s impeccable tone is coupled with an upfront delivery, and the interventions of her partners often have a discreetly startling audacity like Reiersrud s unexpected guitar slide halfway through Borrowed Time, the echoing backbeat and synth hum on Bill Withers Borrowed Time, and the way Qvenild s softly-struck piano enhances the singer s lost-soul intonation of Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child. Slettahjell s performances are heartfelt throughout, but without a lapse in their telling restraint. (The Guardian)
Released 2015.