Turn, Turn, Turn
Listening Post 397. Every generation produces eminent artists who explore the cycles of nature and the brevity of life. From Vivaldi’s seasons to Mahler’s golden goblets to Joni Mitchell’s carousel of time, we are concurrently inspired and challenged by the poetry of creation and mortality. One of the most gifted observer-performers of our own era is the Norwegian singer-songwriter and fiddler Sigrid Moldestad, recipient of numerous honors and accolades, including two Spellemann Prizes, Norway’s Grammy equivalent. Her ninth solo album, Vegane vi vandrar (The Roads We Wander) is a 15-track collection of stories and melodies probing—and keeping in balance—beauty and fragility, community and family, roots and migration, the finite and the infinite. In her customary brand of Norwegian folk leavened with contemporary and world sounds, she is joined on the new album by band mate-friends she has played with for half her life. In Sirklar og hjul (Circles and Wheels, video 1), Moldestad traces the interplay between meteorological seasons and individual development, searching for patterns and growth: “Thoughts that took flight come back,” she sings, “They have been on a journey, now return like a friend/Maybe you’ll open the door to a faint old song/Humming fervently, this time without tears.” In Skal du møte våren (Will You Greet the Spring?) she looks at romance, connection and loss, admittedly with more questions than answers. Livet (Life) is her reflection on aging and identity, evoking Breim, the village where she grew up, amid fjord landscapes and towering peaks that create dramatic shifts of shadow and light. One of the album’s most personal songs, FemtiFemti (Fifty-Fifty) ruminates on shared parenting after a separation, and how it can affect a child’s experience of love. All of these observations and wonderings lead inevitably to the title track, a meditation on life’s path, its meaning and impact. Looking at the cosmos and in the mirror, Moldestad is on a trajectory to the constellation of great artists whose work spans the ages. (Aminje Records)

Sigrid Moldestad: Vegane vi vandrar / The Roads We Wander
Sigrid Moldestad: Vocals, Hardanger fiddle, fiddle, ukulele
Jørgen Sandvik: Guitars, ukulele, charango, banjo, vocals
Kåre Opheim: Drums, percussion
Anders Bitustøyl: Bass, vocals
Sigbjørn Apeland: Harmonium, piano
Roald Kaldestad: Guitars, vocals

Guest artists:
Einar Sogstad: Philicorda organ, keyboards, glockenspiel
Anette Thorsheim: Diatonic button accordion

Related posts. Sigrid Moldestad: Så ta mitt hjerte – Dei beste songane (Take My Heart – Best Songs), Listening Post 78, Dec. 19, 2016. https://worldlisteningpost.com/2016/12/19/sigrid-moldestad-sa-ta-mitt-hjerte-dei-beste-songane/

Sigrid Moldestad: Vere her (Where I Want to Be), Listening Post 146, April 18, 2018. https://worldlisteningpost.com/2018/04/18/sigrid-moldestad-vere-her/

Sigrid Moldestad, Tonen i meg (The Tone in Me), Listening Post 310, July 7, 2021. https://worldlisteningpost.com/2021/07/07/sigrid-moldestad-tonen-i-meg/

Note. Sigrid Moldestad’s song Eg ser inn i augo dine (When I Look in Your Eyes) is ranked #87 on World Listening Post’s list, The Global 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. https://worldlisteningpost.com/the-global-500-greatest-songs-of-all-time-page-1/

Sirklar & hjul / Circles & Wheels
Lyrics & music: Sigrid Moldestad

Everything I have seen, everything I pray in my mind
Is old from before, like vintage wine
Fashions that change, all dresses are blue
Or purple, or yellow, as they were in the spring

Thoughts that took flight come back again
They have been on a journey, now return like a friend
Maybe you’ll open the door, for a faint old song
Humming fervently, this time without tears

There are circles and wheels
There is solstice and spring
It is summer, it is winter
It is autumn that reigns
Hearing the words again
I think we are turning a leaf, a page
In a book, in our lives
Drifting on the open sea

Opening windows and gates, hearts and minds
It feels new, but familiar, soon to be your friend
Have we met before? Are we circles that turn?
Meeting eyes for the first time, but understanding

There you are!

Skal du møte våren / Will You Greet the Spring?
Lyrics & music: Sigrid Moldestad

(From the Norwegian lyrics)
Are you going to greet spring with someone this year?
I wonder as the snow falls on the street as I walk
Are you happier now? Is there anything new in your life?
Will you see the cherry trees with someone you’re walking with?

Will you enjoy the summer with a car and a tent for two?
See the sea sparkle in the waves on a summer evening?
Walk on dewy grass in the morning sun
Hear the last notes from the party, just you and her?

Are you going to have a date in September?
Have you found someone to watch a series with?
When the lights shine on all the city streets
Will you walk arm in arm while the snow falls?

I think more than I should, and I wonder
What if we had met before?
We danced well, but life was out of sync
Now I’ve lost my rhythm
And wonder if I’ll find it again

Maybe spring will bring me new notes
Autumn air will sharpen my thoughts
Perhaps summer will offer me new flowers
And December’s Christmas lights will find my heart

Livet / Life
Lyrics & music: Sigrid Moldestad

Those are the lines I see, the lines when I laugh
A little gray in my hair, that showed up yesterday
So much will fade, changes are on the way
Those are the lines of life, taking hold of me

Met a classmate in Sjødén dress and glasses
Told she had it all, she lives faster than me
With a cabin in the mountains and money for retirement
While I keep asking what I want to be when I grow up
Life: The path of time reveals itself

Going on a hot streak and walking, with hormones lurking
Starting to cry when I see my mother in the yard standing and laughing
The wrinkles in her face show the path of a woman’s life
In those soft mother’s cheeks that I love, I see it
Life: The path of time reveals itself

I left the village, but always long for home
Still dreaming of a garden and a small house in Breim
But the city took me in, suddenly the years have become too many
I keep thinking about moving, but it’s a little late for regret

I wish I was kinder to who I was
When I look at old pictures, how young and beautiful I was!
I wish I could go back and say
“You’re good enough. You’ll manage this!”
Life: The path of time reveals itself

I should sharpen my attitude, embrace what is happening
No creams or cures can change it
Now listen to the trail show the way to all the routes I found
The short life that we have shouldn’t be wasted on shame!
Life: The path of time reveals itself

But okay, I’m not ready. I have age-anxiety, like everyone
Often I stand on stage and show the decay
But then I look around and find new inspiration
From bearded gentlemen, and she who keeps going north

I take comfort in that, it was quite easy to get here
The stories are many from a half-gone woman’s life
I really hope I become an eccentric old woman
Who plays the fiddle, and drinks cava with friends as reinforcement!

Life’s path reveals itself in time

FemtiFemti / Fifty-Fifty
Lyrics & music: Sigrid Moldestad

Swap houses, swap weeks/Divide a hundred in two
One week with your father/Then a week with me
We’ll never truly understand/What it was like for you
We tried to patch up life/Your dad and I

We all became good friends/Celebrated birthdays and Christmas
We made the best of it/Now you’re the one moving out
A fifty-fifty life growing up/Has it left any wounds?
Will you dare to believe in love/Even though things went a little wrong with us?

Be open to life’s tension/To the one that makes you feel gentle and dizzy
The one that takes hold of the day/And makes you toss and turn at night
I sincerely hope you dare/If you meet the One
Open your heart/Remember that often things go well

It didn’t turn out the way we thought it would/Adult life is complicated
But we are your parents/No one can take that away from us
Life offers us so much/We both have hurt
But we share this beautiful bond/We are father and mother.

Swap houses, swap weeks/Divide a hundred in two
You’ve packed many bags/That’s the end of it now
You’re moving away from both of us/We proudly watch you go
And if we wish anything for you/It is especially this…

Be open to life’s tension/To the one that makes you feel gentle and dizzy
The one that takes hold of the day/And makes you toss and turn at night
I sincerely hope you dare/If you meet the One
Open your heart/Remember that often things go well.

Vegane (vi vandrar) / The Roads (We Wander)
Lyrics & music: Sigrid Moldestad

The roads we walk will be grown over and disappear
The forests we behold will be gone
The flowers in your garden will fade and wither
But in the east, the sun will always rise

The night you lie awake will bring the dawn
All our heavy thoughts will clear
What you worry about will soon make you wiser
The snow on the ground will melt

We are the people of the earth, neighbors who find shelter
We wander the roads, we walk them together
We are you, you are we, humans and animals
We live here and we must stick together

All that you own is your innermost self
There you live, and there you are alone
As we are all alone in our inner house
There we are all unique and one

But all unrest is silenced if you stop and see
the small wonders that gently stand and tremble:
A leaf, a flower, an ant or a mountain
The rush of the eternal river

Then we become earth, become drops and water
Maybe we rise to heaven like a cloud
A rainy day, a flower meadow
Nature and wonder again