album preview

When you listen to Sunleif Rasmussen's music, it's easy to hear the inspiration from the Faroese landscape. His childhood on Sandoy (‘Sand Island') with the omnipresent Atlantic, the dunes, the lyme-grass and the bitter winds can explain much of the highly sensory musical experiences you can get from Sunleif's music.

According to the composer his tonal idiom too is Faroese. But it's almost impossible to hear it. Deep within the musical structure lie remains of old Faroese songs that Sunleif Rasmussen has collected, broken up and rebuilt into a modern storehouse of notes. Notes that can reasonably be called both his own and new – but which at the same time have a relationship with the tradition and history.

But all this Faroese heritage can also seem beside the point. With this world premiere recording of Sunleif Rasmussen's works for strings it is clear that the point of departure for Rasmussen's music may be Faroese – or at any rate ultra-Nordic – but its stature is global.