Every singer-songwriter has to have command of their instrument, their voice and their native language. But some, like Sofia Ekberg, have elevated their craft to a higher level.
“She’s one of the top musicians and performers in Sweden,” local promoter Kiki Wow says. “She has a really clean, clear, crisp voice – it holds you in. And she’s mastered the act of storytelling in her songwriting.”
No one is more taken aback by that than Ekberg.
“When I was very young, I played guitar and sang songs and stuff,” she says, “but I never really thought that it was possible to do that as a job.”
Ekberg almost didn’t make it. She quit songwriting and went into musical theater instead. Then she went through a three-year period where she didn’t sing professionally at all, thinking her voice was “broken.” Luckily, it was just tired.
“Musical theater is a very stressful kind of singing,” Ekberg says. “You have to sing certain notes in a certain way very strong and loud. I left musical theater and I thought I would never sing again.”
Ekberg rediscovered her love of songwriting by embracing the freedom of her own expressions – instead of trying to sing a certain way like she did in theater.
Ekberg went to a songwriting retreat in Ben Lomond, she says, “to see if could get some inspiration and to try to believe in my songs again.”
It was there that she met Kiki Wow.
“I just fell in love with her singing from the very first note,” Wow says.
These days Ekberg divides her time between teaching songwriting in her native Sweden, playing with fellow writers Patrick Rydman and Henrik Cederblom in a trio called My Quiet Companion, and writing and touring solo in Europe and the U.S.
“I like playing solo because it keeps me on the edge,” she says. “It’s a little challenging to go out on your own with just your guitar, but I think it’s good for me.”
SOFIA EKBERG
- 6-9pm Friday, Aug. 4 at Caffe Trieste, 409 Alvarado Ave., Monterey
- 9:30am Saturday, Aug. 5, live on KPIG radio, 107.5 FM
- 7:30-9:30pm Saturday, Aug. 5 at Rosie’s Country Store, 1 Esquiline Road, Carmel Valley
- House concert on Sunday, Aug. 6, 235-7662 to RSVP and for location, time and details.
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