I am happy to present to you the songs of the LIGHTSONGS #1 album. Little about the story behind them. I began with ANOWA, the final song of the album. Let’s continue with STILLA MIN SJÄL, the song before Anowa. So.. I started from the end and work myself towards the beginning. While Anowa is a stubborn, uncompromising song, with incredibly firm opinions about everything, Stilla Min Själ is of a different kind of energy. With her you rest assured. There is nothing to worry about. She is mild, warm, tender, peaceful and floating. To work with her calms the atmosphere, makes it still. It is as she is singing within you.. that all is well. All is well.
But let us take it from the beginning. Stilla Min Själ is the oldest of all the LightSongs. She arrived already in the early days of the Pleiadian Suite and I can’t even recall how she entered the world. Maybe she just arrived one day, without making any noice or fuzz about it. It would be totally in line with her being, her flow of energy.
I had just recorded the album HOYA, songs filled with outward, physical and undeveloped raw energy and wanted a counterpart with inward, reflecting, meditative songs. (that would later become OMINE, the second album in the Pleiadian Suite) and Stilla Min Själ was one of the songs considered for that album. My producer at that time believed that with lyrics in Swedish, it wouldn’t work with the other songs. She would stick out, not fit in. So I wrote her new lyrics in the old language and Tada!! Can you imagine; ION KANTEH was born.
Stilla Min Själ had other things going for her. She was introduced during a composers week in Italy where songwriters, classical composers, poets and lyricists had been invited by the church to create hymns and psalms for a new appendix, Psalm 2000, to be used by the Swedish church in their ceremonies. We were about 20-30 people, singing through all the songs we had brought with us, to feel into them, would they work in the ceremonies? were they easy to sing along? To hear STILLA MIN SJÄL sung by the whole group was an amazing, powerful experience and I got goosebumps all over my body.. And this song was one of the songs suggested to be part of the new appendix. It didn’t turn out that way, but oh what an honor to be considered!
Besides that she was abiding her time. I didn’t know it, but I am quite sure she did.
Time passed by and when the LightSongs were about to be recorded, Stilla Min Själ quietly flowed into the group of songs. As peaceful as ever. It was exciting to create a new choir arrangement and not use the old one for ION KANTEH, even if I am sooo in love with that one. The lyrics in the two versions differs too much, both rhythmically and verbally, so I had to write something new. (But a little part of the old sneaked into the new arrangement.. hihi)
The thought behind all LightSongs is that they shall be long. Giving the opportunity for the listener to sink into them, breathe out and slow down. With time enough to learn the melody and the simple, repetitive phrases. Time enough to begin singing along, flowing with the song. And there shall be several instrumental parts. They’ll give space for reflection and rest. So the length of the songs are of great importance. STILLA MIN SJÄL embodies that thought. With her 14 minutes she is the second longest song of all LightSongs. (to compare with her twin ION KANTEH, only 6 minutes long). Every time we worked with STILLA MIN SJÄL at Nilento Studios in Göteborg, she has embraced us all with her peaceful energy, like a warm calm, filling the whole house and everyone inside it with a stillness so powerful, you can almost touch it. What a wonderful gift to experience that.
The LightSongs were divided on three albums. And I put them in alphabetical order. For some reason that worked perfectly. A couple of songs were of a different opinion. One of them was STILLA MIN SJÄL. That was the only time she actually protested or had any comment at all about how things evolved around her. And of course she got it her way. Anything else was totally unthinkable. She now resides together with all the songs that begins with an A.
The lyrics translated to english:
Be still my soul
Be still my heart
All is well
All is Well
Be still my soul
Let worry and anxiety fade away
Let worry and anxiety be
Be still, be still my soul
Be still my soul
here is a longer snippet 4.24
and this is a short one 1.22