Formula Indie Sessions _ Interview with Mama Tjutju
What is your earliest memory connected to music?
My earliest memory connected to music is when I was around 4-5 years old and I couldn’t sleep at night because my mom was in the hospital for some time, I would go downstairs in the evenings after we had been put to bed and my dad would be watching a tape with Rolling Stones concert, and he would let me sit with him watching it together. There was something peaceful about, just being me and him, being allowed to stay with him instead of being sent directly back to bed, the safety of that and a feeling that we were doing something special together. That I got to be a part of something that was important to him, in a way.
How did your passion for creating music begin?
I was very young when I started playing the piano, also around the age of 4-5 years old. I was just playing for fun and playing by ear and early on I just started making up my own little things on the piano. I did have piano lessons later on, but I was not able to catch on to really reading notes, and so I just continued playing by ear and following my own weird internal guidance system while playing the piano. And so very early on, it became a very creative thing for me – because I liked so much to come up with my own little combinations of keys rather than only playing someone else’s song on piano.
What’s the story behind your current music project?
My current music project would be Mama Tjutju – the artist name through which I release my work. I feel that this project is about honesty, vulnerability, authenticity, minimally processed music, minimally processed vocals, preferably one-take recordings, a high degree of improvisation – as this is where vulnerability really comes through, and working together with other artists carrying a similar vision across genres.
How would you describe your sound to someone who has never heard your music before?
It is quite raw, in the sense that the vocal is at the core of the music, and it is with a lot of soul and nerve. My piano recordings are similarly emotionally based. The genres I exist within are neo-soul, acoustic folk, Singer-Songwriter, ambient new age and neo-classical solo piano.
What is one thing you’ve learned that completely changed the way you make music?
If they don’t get it, it doesn’t mean something is wrong with it. It just means what it says – that they didn’t get it. This was the working mantra that got me started and daring to begin to release my style of music, and I still carry it with me as a reminder to stay within my own. Heart, my own vision, my own intention and work and create from there. Because that is what I was meant to do. I was not meant to do something that someone else is already doing.
What tools, instruments, or software are essential in your creative process?
I prefer to have a very minimal set-up at home, and then with certain projects I go to a studio to work with a producer. But for the most part, in my own home, it is my piano, an acoustic guitar, my microphone and a good set of headphones. I record in Garage Band.
Which indie artist or song are you loving right now?
I am enjoying the song ‘Moving’by Eskimotion and ’Motion’ by Peter Sandberg at the moment.
How have your personal experiences influenced your music and artistic vision?
I think particularly with the piano, going through some difficult things early on, all the way back to being a little child, there wasn’t always the space to express verbally how I felt about everything that was happening. Again in my teenage years, another round of difficulty came around, and I know that I somehow used the piano to process my emotions, my pain and my experiences. Somehow it was, and still is, as if there was always a well of emotions and confusion and experiences to draw from whenever I would sit down at the piano and just play whatever came to me. I still feel likeI ‘come home’ to myself whenever I go to the piano. My personal experiences as a young woman and moving away from patriarchal male-gaze specifically structured internally has influenced my lyrical work no the EP ‘Stockholm.’ Generally, it will be themes of interconnectedness, the seasons, love, caring and nature that really infuse my lyrical work. I am a lo-fi girl myself in my listening, so there will most likely be that slower atmosphere in my work musically.
What emotions or messages do you hope listeners take from your work?
I hope listeners take away from my work a sense of authenticity, a sense of having been seen in some of their own deepest emotions and truest hopes. I also hope they will find some peace, some nourishment for the heart and somehow having arrived more into the present moment through listening.
What’s the most important lesson music has taught you so far?
Music can be the closest thing to truth, outside of silence, we can be with.
What is a dream venue or festival you would love to perform at?
Intimacy is such a key aspect to my work, that smaller intimate and intentional spaces are generally what works for me. But to be able to play outside in the wild nature, whether that be in the Swedish forest, in the rainforest in Brazil, by the ocean in Portugal, by the foot of a mountain in Iceland or on a floating piece of ice in the arctic, that would be the dream. The Music House in my hometown Aalborg, Denmark, would be a wonderful experience too.
If you could collaborate with any artist, past or present, who would it be and why?
Icelandic Ólafur Arnalds is at the moment the artist I am most drawn to working with right now.
Where can our listeners follow and support your music? (Website,Spotify, IG, links)
My website is www.mamatjutju.com
You can find all my released music on Bandcamp https://mamatjutju.bandcamp.com
My Spotify is https://open.spotify.com/artist/66egPxe1r9hkpjkGuDyX8Q?si=_yz24kLFTAC6bb5-ZjVCfg
You can find me on Youtube as well, and most importantly – if you want to really step into my world of music and support it as well – you are more than welcome to join my Patreon. Links to everything is one my website as well.
Looking toward the future, what’s your dream for the next chapter of your musical journey?
For my next chapter of my musical journey my dream is to work more with other artists, making beautiful moments and collaborations, as well as more live shows. Creating beautiful live music moments in beautiful settings where the audience can have the opportunity to find real healing, real joy and harmony inside. I can’t wait.
What do you hope listeners will discover about you along the way?
I hope listeners will discover that I am consistent, that I have a drive, that I know what I am doing, that I am deeply committed to creating music and lyrics that uplift, support, nurture, heal and elevate whomever is listening. I hope the listeners will discover that I am entirely myself, and that I create from the heart entirely.
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