Erik Wøllo – Where the River widens

Description

Tracks:

01 Silent Creek
02 Confluence
03 Estuarial
04 Quiet Reach
05 Inscape 1
06 Open Waters
07 Inscape 2
08 Where the River Widens
09 Through the Backdrop
10 The Beach
11 Beneath the Ember Sky

Eleven meditative, atmospheric tracks filled with elegant melodic clarity form Norwegian electronic musician Erik Wøllo’s latest album. The impressionistic, minimalist electric guitar lines are looped and layered with effect pedals for a seamless balance of intimacy and spaciousness. Created and inspired in the valley of Skåbu, Norway, during the late summer of 2024, the 44-minute album is imbued with the spirit of its mountainous surroundings. It captures a slow tranquil intensity preserving spontaneous moments.

Erik reflects: “I was invited to be Artist in Residence at Skåbu in the high-altitude mountains of the Jotunheimen region. For two weeks I focused on creating art, using the facilities to work on woodcuts, linocuts and more. I, of course, brought my guitar and my looping pedals, and was inspired to record a lot of new material which I later refined in my home studio. Everything was performed and composed on the fly. I tried to retain the purity of those initial performances with just a few elements and details added later for a subtly broader expression. Each track is a kind of meditation on stillness and introspection. That could be a metaphor for a slow drift down a calm widening river: a gentle flow, yet filled with life.”

Water and a river’s state of flux can be a metaphor for life’s evolution. When small mountain creeks turn into rivers, then culminate and meet to form a delta, then end in a lake or the ocean. “The delta is where the river widens and where the water is quiet,” Erik notes. “This gave the inspiration and the title for this album. The theme draws inspiration from the mountains and rivers as metaphors for untouched, pure nature existing on its own terms.”

Where the River Widens’ organic expression and sonic texture evoke a seamless fusion of emotion and stillness.