Fresh from her Swedish Grammis win for Jazz of the Year 2025, vocalist and composer Sara Aldén returns with Force of Nature, the final chapter in a trilogy that has traced an intensely personal and artistic journey over the past few years. Rooted in jazz yet reaching far beyond it, the album brings together elements of Swedish folk, improvisation, and raw, embodied expression, delivered through the deep musical trust of her long-standing trio and a carefully chosen group of collaborators.
In this conversation, Aldén reflects on arriving at her voice and creative identity, the emotional and philosophical threads that connect the trilogy, and the balance between the personal and the political in her work. She speaks candidly about the role of intuition, the physicality of singing, and the importance of vulnerability in both composition and performance, offering insight into a record that feels as much like an artistic statement as it does a continuation of an evolving musical path.
Force of Nature completes a trilogy that began with A Room of One’s Own. When you look back across these three records, what feels resolved, and what still feels open?
Wow, great question!I think what feels resolved is me finding my place in jazz, a room of ones own if you will – I truly find like I’ve landed and arrived in my voice and sound, that me and my trio has built something truly special, both in how we make music but also how we compose and create as humans. The process of making the music is such a joy and so effortless in so many ways, I present a raw material with thoughts, soundscapes and structures and from that we improvise and create in the most joyous way. I think I will be grateful my whole life that I’ve had the luck of experiencing this. What still feels open might be the thought of what comes next – this last album is the end of this trilogy, and I’m so curious what lies ahead – what comes next and what music we have in us in the future. The future of music feels open and it calls me!
The album centers around ideas of regeneration, of continuing after collapse. At what point did you realise that this would be the emotional core of the record?
I knew it as we made the debut album “There Is No Future”. I knew that so many threads had to be tied together in this last album and that “There Is No Future was a huge questionmark, challenging me and the listener of opening up to new ways of living and how we perceíve the world, so I knew that this last album #Force of Nature” had to carry the weight of trying to provide the answers.
Your music often moves between the personal and the political. How do you approach that balance without one overshadowing the other?
Hum, that’s also a really good question. I think for me it might be a shift work between the two, but I also believe that they are forever entangled, intertwined and can’t be without the other. Whatever I write, compose or think is situated knowledge, produced in my body, with my mind and experiences as a part of the raw material, there is no way that me as an artist can erase myself from myself or my life when I create – and if I choose to try to do exactly that – an experiment if you will – then that is also situated in my life and done by me as a choice too, for whatever reason I motivate this experiment, it is a direct consequence of me wanting to try this experiment out. And that, once again, says more about me that the piece in itself I think.
You’ve described this album as being about different forms of love, self, child, earth, and beyond. How did those ideas shape the way you wrote and structured the material?
It came to me in moments of lust and joy – and from joyous consequences in my own life – my sister became a first time mom, and to see her go through that, and to experience a new life come to life so up close was extremely shaping for me. That I am him and he is me. We belong. And in that way we all do. In him I see the seed, the bud and the stars. I see everything in him. He is life.
The trio you work with has been together for some time now. How has that long-standing relationship influenced the sound and freedom you hear on this record?
I think it’s profound. The trust and the reliance I have with them in the music is something think one can hear. And almost reach out and touch. The stability of knowing that wherever anyone of us goes, the other follows is just such a luxury and joy to get to experience! I think it really effects the sound and makes the music more specious and profound, we can leave space and take place all of us, knowing that all of us are very caring about the music, the big picture and the group sound. It’s like running barefoot and blindfolded on a well know trail track, but without any pine needles getting in your feet or roots to stumble over. Soft but wild.
While the trio remains central, you’ve brought in collaborators like Hannes Bennich, Nils Landgren, and Michelle Willis. What did each of them add to the emotional or sonic landscape of the album?
Nisse brought such a clarity and strength into his part of the song Lean On Me – he has such an effortless sound and playing style that just gives this, otherwise quite anxious song stability and faith to carry on. The Rain with Hannes Bennich needed insanity, rage and a thunderstorm – so he brought it. Hannes is a longtime friend of mine and I loved his sound from the first time I heard him. He has that feeling when he plays that I crave in music – the feeling that this is a matter of life and death. That he goes all in and leaves nothing being, he doesn’t look back and he doesent hesitate on doing that. I love that about him. So in making The Rain I wanted him to come in from nowhere and strike us like a lightning, blow us away like a thunderstorm and then leave suddenly – just like the storm when it moves on. And he truly brings that to the song. And lastly, Michelle in Unlearn, she brings the voice of a soul that sings. I’ve loved her sound and effortless phrasing and sound building, and I knew that this song about reflecting, introspecting and relearning was one for her to make her own. Such a wonderful thing to also make it a duett, do take turns and think about these matters, a conversation between us if you will.
The record feels both intimate and expansive at the same time. How did you approach creating that sense of scale while keeping the music grounded in personal expression?
I think the starting point is small matters, small big feelings, small, intimate simple songs. Plain and no fuss, say what you mean, say it out loud. Clear and simple. I think that’s the intimacy, And in the silence between us in the trio, I think thats a very intimate space. And that’s a great gift with not having drums, the space we get as a group is extremely lush to explore. And from the silence, intimacy and plainness we then embroider the sound scape around it – sometimes it becomes screams and extreme intensity where the song also stops to care about singing it “clean” or “nice” or “pitch perfect”. I don’t prioritize that when we pic takes and mix. A lot of the time songs with more feeling and ugly sound will be the once we pick – to keep the body of the song and to not make it into something it is not. And the songs often show us where to go – with The Rain for example it was easy because the text guided us in how to play and what to express and in what way to express it. But in This Tree Once Used to Bloom (for Palestine) it was not as simple as that. We had to make it grand when it was called for but not make it overpowering and too large, because there is a fine line when you can risk to overdo a theme, pushing it too far in dynamics or arranging and then make the meaning of it hollow. You have to hold back sometime to make space for the art, for the listener to make what they need of it, it’s not for me to feed them with my thoughts and reasons. It’s theirs.
Improvisation seems to play a key role in how the music unfolds. How much of what we hear was shaped in the moment versus carefully composed beforehand?
We have open parts in all the songs more or less where we open up for free impro, wich keep the song alive and on it’s toes, but a lot of the foundation in the songs are arranged parts that we move from into free impro and then back on que to another arranged part.
Your work draws from jazz, Swedish folk tradition, and a broader musical language. At this stage, do you still think in terms of influences, or has it become a more instinctive process?
Great question! I think where I am now I sing intuitively and I sing what I love singing – I lean towards vocal techniques that I know my voice sounds good in, in keys that I know my voice will bloom in. I think I thought before that I had a sound that I had to “accept” and work with form there but now I know that instead of singing like I have earlier in my life and just keep on doing that – I can choose to sing the things that I love listening to – practice the techniques from musical for example, that makes an amazing foundation or both belting and twanging, both very powerful tools to make big dynamic changes just like you mention above.
There’s a strong sense of embodiment in the music, of voice, breath, and physical presence. How conscious are you of the body when you’re composing and performing?
I think I try to let my body be a part of making the music – I’ve noticed the more I play also that there is a power tool in the instrument voice – which is affect. When I feel something in my body and consciously think about what I’m singing and want to communicate with the song I have a totally different access to my voice and range, especially the more powerful places of my voice. When I sing something perhaps during rehearsals, when I’m not as committed or engaged I notice that it tares more on my voice and sounds more airy and weak. So in allowing my body to be committed to the music I also allow the voice to shine in its rightful way.
The album has been described as an artistic manifesto. Did it feel that way while you were making it, or has that meaning emerged afterwards?
Absolutely, it was a part of making the music, like an outspoken foundation in the work. To make it into more of an art piece allowed us as musicians to lean into what we heard in our heads and not what we think we want us and jazz to sound like. In allowing us to lean more into the art and the meaning of the music, letting that sit in the driver’s seat, we allowed ourselves to stay open and curious, which I think also creates the specific sound we have.
Finally, Force of Nature suggests both strength and vulnerability. What do you hope listeners carry with them after spending time with this music?
Perhaps questions about themselves, open and curious thoughts of looking at yourself and the world – both with a kind eye but at the same time a critical one. Even though the album carries symbols of power, hope and moving forward there is always an underlying question of selfreflection, to see oneself, again and again. I think it encourages responsibility. Who am I in this world, what am I doing to connect with myself and others and how do I contribute to the weave of creating solutions, contact and a way forward – for everyone.
