Seinabo Sey: 2015

Seinabo Sey’s debut album is still a work in progress, but the 24-year-old Stockholm-based singer with the mighty, supple voice has already won the Swedish equivalent of the Grammy for “Best New Artist,” performed at the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize concert, and her visage is even on a postage stamp in her home country. Although Sey’s video presence, on singles like the commanding, gospel-stoked anthem “Hard Time,” is regal and unruffled, in person Sey is warm, funny, relaxed, and chatty.

Sey (pronounced “sea”) has released two EPs thus far named after her parents: For Madeline, available in the States this year, and For Maudo, recently released in Scandinavia and a small tribute to her late father, the Gambian musician Maudo Sey. She recently performed for WFUV at SXSW, but this spring, Sey, joined by bandmate Theodore Arvidsson Kylin, also paid a visit to Studio A to play two songs from For Madeline: “Younger” and the aforementioned “Hard Time." The young singer also talked about her ongoing collaboration with producer Magnus Lidehäll (Katy Perry, Kelis), the influence of her parents on her musical path and the cultural climate of Sweden as opposed to her beloved western Africa.

[Recorded: 4/28/15; Audio and video from this session is no longer available.]