Fredrik Saroea with BIT20 Ensemble – Rona Diaries: The Chamber Versions Live at the Grieg Hall
Exclusive premiere of DATAROCK’s Fredrik Saroea and BIT20 Ensemble performing at Bergen International Festival.
“The entire album is somewhat inspired by that scene in [iconic 1986 John Hughes film] Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”, says Fredrik Saroea about the compelling force that led him to create his new album ‘Rona Diaries: The Chamber Versions Live at The Grieg Hall, Bergen’ out today via YAP Records.
A unique collaboration with acclaimed Norwegian chamber quartet BIT20 Ensemble that weaves his indie rock sensibilities seamlessly into a lush and orchestral tapestry, his new album envelopes itself in the carpe diem message of the seminal teen comedy. “After Ferris tells his cynical best friend Cameron to “stop and look around once in a while”, Cameron “drowns” himself in the painting A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte by Georges Seurat in a museum visit as a Dream Academy’s instrumental version of The Smiths’ ‘Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want’ plays in the background, he continues, referencing the lyrics that borrow heavily from the classic Smiths tune.
Best known as the frontman of the critically acclaimed Norwegian global disco punk outfit DATAROCK, Saroea describes the live album as “sad songs served on a bed of orchestrated beauty. It was arranged by Bjørn Morten Christophersen for the amazing BIT20 Ensemble, our acclaimed, national contemporary art music orchestra extraordinaire and represented here by four musicians from all around the world performing on 300-year-old instruments. They magically create lines between my humble songwriting and the timeless etheric nature of skillful execution of the art and passed-down tradition of intricate arrangements and entirely live interplay without any kind of metric backing tracks or conductor”.
“My new album is simply the live recording of the premier of all this material – newly orchestrated for the BIT2 Ensemble for my release concert for last year’s studio album. The performance took place at the grand Grieg Hall during the 69th annual Bergen International Festival — the largest art music festival in the Nordic countries. Luckily we even filmed the performance for their live stream — not knowing the live recordings would end up becoming the album now mixed by the two times Grammy winning miracle of a man, Mark Rankin in Los Angeles. In today’s premier you get to see just how nervous and surprised I was to hear how well the material worked out — even though we only had two short rehearsals for the 208 page score BIT20 we’re performing. So enjoy 30 minutes of nerve wracking joy – and the live footage of the entire new album — recorded live in front of an audience”. Fredrik Saroea
Combining his passion for indie rock with sweeping pastoral soundscapes, Saroea combined forces live with BIT20’s string quartet: Martin Shultz on violin, Liene Klava on viola, Agnese Rugevica on cello, Johannes Wik on harp with arrangements by Bjørn Morten Christophersen. The performance was recorded by Andre Luciano Trebbi (Kings of Convenience) at infamous The Grieg Hall during Norway’s 69th annual Bergen International Festival (which took place on May 28, 2021). ‘Battered & Bruised’, along with prior singles, ‘Heaven Knows Those Songs Weren’t Heaven Sent’, ‘A Matter of Dying’ and ‘Bulletproof Vest’, were adapted from ‘Rona Diaries’ while singles ‘Bergheim’ and ‘Understatement Lovesong’ are exclusive to ‘Rona Diaries: The Chamber Versions Live At The Grieg Hall, Bergen’ and were premiered to an unsuspecting public who were more familiar with Saroea’s other band’s rhythmic brand of dance music.
As COVID-19 shut down live music in 2020, Saroea started recording solo material that became his first solo album ‘Rona Diaries’ at YAP Records’ studio in Bergen, Norway with the help of DATAROCK drummer Øyvind Solheim engineering, mixing and co-producing. The 12 songs were then mastered by UK’s GRAMMY®-nominated Mike Marsh (Björk, Massive Attack, Basement Jaxx, Depeche Mode) and released May 28, 2021.
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