Anja Garbarek

Daughter of jazz composer and saxophonist Jan Garbarek, Anja Garbarek creates electronic music often classified as "avant garde pop".

Her singing style resembles that of Stina Nordenstam, but where Stina's whisper-singing sounds as though she's afraid of being overheard, Anja is much more confident.

The music is more difficult to describe. On the surface it's an intensely dark mixture of quiet jazz, pop and a bit of british trip hop. But if you listen carefully you'll hear pieces of world music, dub, Norwegian folk, and much harder electronica breaking through. It's music eclecticism in its best form.

Each of her three albums show signs of her progressing as a composer, with the latest one, Smiling & Waving, having a much more organic, natural feel to it. This is probably a result of the fact that she is collaborating with a wide range of well known musicians (or mavericks, as Virgin Norway choose to describe them).

She is most often compared with Björk, Jane Siberry, Stina Nordenstam and Lori Carson.

Discography