Ida Sand - Do You Hear Me? - New CD

In 2020, the authorities in Sweden tried to keep normal life going for as long as possible, but, even there, things were eventually brought to a halt by Corona. And like everywhere else, musicians were among the hardest-hit. "It felt somehow as if one of my limbs had been severed,” recalls Ida Sand. “I had a longing to sing, I was missing music so much." The Stockholm-based singer/pianist is a well-established artist with a strong and long-standing following in several countries across Europe, so her diary would normally have been full. The lack of work, it turned out, was having a similar effect on her long-term colleague, keyboardist/organist Jesper Nordenström. "One day he called me,” she recalls. “'Let's meet in my studio and let's just do something'. Okay, I said, I can try to bring some compositions. We asked some more friends if they wanted to play. It all came from the simple desire finally to be doing again what we all love: making music together. We played four or five pieces and agreed to meet again. I promised I’d bring some new material for the next time, and I did. It was amazingly motivating to be back doing my job..."

The result is Do You Hear Me?. The phrase is used a lot, but here it has a special significance: this is Ida Sand's most personal album to date, and not least because she has written all of the ten songs herself. "Before every project, you ask yourself: what should my next step be? In this case it was very clear: for the first time, I wanted to record my own songs, and only my own songs." But that's not the only reason why Do You Hear Me? has turned into such a strong singer/songwriter album. Sand has always seen herself as more of a soul singer than a jazz singer, and in terms of emotions, these tunes hold nothing back. They aim directly for the heart. "I didn't think much about the songs before I wrote them. It all just came together when we were in the studio. One track, ‘Too Close for Comfort’, I wrote when I got home after a session. It took me about half an hour, I was in such a state of creative flow, I literally couldn't stop!"