Live at Kilden
"Twenty years later, we decided to mark the event by doing an anniversary concert. We wanted to tell our story through our music. This album is a live recording of this concert - each piece and each song telling a special story and representing a key moment in our journey."
TRACK LISTING AND NOTES
Fionnuala Sherry on violin and Rolf Lovland on piano
All music by Rolf Lovland
- Celebration
- Nocturne (featuring Cathrine Iversen)
- Silent Wings (featuring Ole Edvard Antonsen)
- Elan
- Heartstrings / I've Dreamed of You (featuring Tracey Campbell)
- My Land (featuring Espen Grjotheim)
- Grace (featuring Ole Edvard Antonsen)
- Sleepsong (featuring Cathrine Iversen)
- Sometimes When It Rains
- Ode to Simplicity / Simply You (featuring Tracey Campbell and Ole Edvard Antonsen)
- Steps
- Did I Not Love You (featuring Espen Grjotheim and Cathrine Iversen)
- Hymn to Hope / Sometimes a Prayer Will Do (featuring Tracey Campbell)
- The Reel
- You Raise Me Up (featuring Espen Grjotheim and Tracey Campbell)
- Song from a Secret Garden
- Thank You (featuring Espen Grjotheim, Cathrine Iversen, Tracey Campbell and Ole Edvard Antonsen)
MY REVIEW AND COMMENTS
This stunning live recording took place in the new Kilden Concert Hall in Kristiansand, Norway, hometown of Rolf Lovland and several of the band members. It was a colossal event in celebration of Secret Garden's twentieth anniversary, and included an outstanding cast of musicians and singers, along with the Kristiansand Symphony Orchestra. And the remarkable thing about this concert is that it was the first live performance for Fionnuala Sherry since her horrific ordeal last year.
The album and concert opens with Celebration, a truly fitting piece not only for Secret Garden's historic anniversary, but for Fionnuala's remarkable recovery as well. As you listen to this album you will hear many of Secret Garden's greatest pieces - Nocturne, the ethereal piece that "started it all" by winning the Eurovision Song Contest back in 1995; Hymn to Hope, an emotion packed "tour de force" for world peace; Grace, the beautiful baroque-style duo for trumpet and violin; You Raise Me Up, a powerful "blockbuster" song not only for the ensemble but for the songwriters Rolf Lovland and Brendan Graham as well; and of course Song from a Secret Garden, which showcases the heart and soul of Secret Garden, Rolf and Fionnuala, the founders of this amazing ensemble. In addition to a number of other great pieces, both instrumental and vocal, Secret Garden has discerningly blended two of their pieces into a single medley on three of the tracks.
The musicians and singers poured their heart and soul into this performance as they have done many, many times over the past twenty years. Guest singers Cathrine Iversen, Espen Grjotheim and Tracey Campbell breathed life into the vocal pieces, and trumpet player Ole Edvard Antonsen added some stunning performances to the concert. In the liner notes Rolf Lovland stated that "hopefully, some of the energy is captured in this album". I can truly say that indeed it was!
The album and concert Live at Kilden is a true testament to the twenty year legacy of Secret Garden, and a "must have" for all fans both new and old. Thank you Secret Garden for a very fitting celebration of twenty amazing years of outstanding music making!
