International relevance: **
Lillemor Lind is a Dalecarlian singer who made
her debut on record on the ”Tjejclown” album in
1974. She wrote one of the songs on Lena Ekman's second album in 1980
and also contributed some recordings to a couple of folk albums
around the same time. Her full length solo debut came with ”Så draga vi upp till
Dalom igen”, with songs from her native Dalarna region, something she
passionately researched beside her singing. Lind also had a thorough
interest in foreign musics, particularly from Latin America, the Near
East and the Balkans as reflected by the two Macedonian songs on
”Hjortronblom and kärleksört”. Both her albums were released
through Proprius, known to blog readers from Leif Strands Kammarkör,
Lena Granhagen and Elisabet Hermodsson, meaning they have a very
particular ambience.
”Hjortronblom och
kärleksört” is Lind's most interesting album thanks to the musicians involved. It features Arbete &
Fritid key members Roland Keijser and Ove Karlsson, as well as
fiddler Anders Rosén who made several albums with Keijser plus took
a leading role on ”Sen dansar vi ut”. (A further Arbete &
Fritid connection is Rolf Lundqvist who took the group photo on the
album cover.) Also present are members from jazz outfit Opposite
Corner.
The sound and the arrangements are
wonderfully moody and the songs– both traditional and original – are beautiful and melancholy with a
prominent archaic character. The main problem is Lillemor Lind
herself. Her vocal style has a kind of preciosity to it, as if she
was classically trained and had lost some touch with the
vernacularity of the songs. It's not a constantly up front problem,
but you can always sense it under the surface and now and then it
comes through. That spoils it somewhat for me and I can't help but
imagining what this would have been like had Marie Selander or Lena
Ekman been in Lind's place. As it
stands now, it's an intrinsically great album that never reaches its
full potential.
Full album playlist
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