We Speak Music
Katie Dauson Delivers New Album ‘Dauson City Gold Rush’
Katie Dauson’s Dauson City Gold Rush is an album driven by narrative, empathy, and emotional detail—a record that feels like a songwriter peeling back the film on memory to study the flicker underneath. Across eight tracks, Dauson blends blues, folk-rock, and 1980s pop reverie with an ear for textures that expand rather than overwhelm. It’s a deeply human album, concerned less with answers than with learning to sit with the complexity of feeling.
The opening “Scene Stealing Casanova” frames that emotional thesis perfectly. It is fleet, witty, and gently self-mocking—an acknowledgement of the strange push-pull between ambition and doubt. Dauson’s delivery feels lived-in, the kind of songwriting that turns private anxieties into communal recognition.
“Just Another Love Song” unfolds like a sepia photograph rediscovered in a drawer. Its melodic grace nods to the lineage of classic pop writers, but Dauson treats influence as dialogue, not costume. She writes with the perspective of someone who understands that sincerity is not naïve—it’s courageous.
At the album’s core sits the instrumental “Gold Rush,” which speaks in atmosphere where words would have cluttered the message. The slide guitar carries a kind of wistful promise, and in that promise is the emotional axis of the project: the sense of searching without expecting certainty.
The record ends with “Sing a Song,” a track that refuses grandeur in favour of gentle uplift. It’s not the triumphant finale of a hero returning victorious—it’s the sound of someone choosing to keep going. Dauson City Gold Rush is Katie Dauson’s reminder that growth is process, identity is mosaic, and music can hold the vulnerable parts of us without asking for shame.
We Speak Music
Christian Balvig releases gorgeous new album ‘Find And You Will Seek’ in collaboration with Ensemble Hermes.
Acclaimed composer and arranger Christian Balvig is known for his work with an array of artists and bands like Jade, Efterklang, Lowly, When Saints Go Machine and Mew, as well as his work with some of the most acclaimed orchestras like Royal Northern Sinfonia (BBC Proms), The Royal Danish Orchestra, Copenhagen Phil, London Contemporary Orchestra, The Danish Radio Broadcast Orchestra and The Norwegian Wind Ensemble.
The cinematic sound on his new album might echo Balvig’s work in the world of film and TV music. Scoring the 2025 Oscar shortlisted short movie ‘Eternal Father’ and the Danish hit series ‘Cry Wolf’ (Ulven Kommer), which has been shown on television in more than 30 countries around the globe, including Channel 4 in the UK. He was also nominated for a Harpa award for ‘Best score’ last year at the Berlinale for ‘The Son and the Moon (Min Arv Bor I Dig)’.
Balvig’s new album, ‘Find And You Will Seek’, backed by Danish string group Ensemble Hermes, grew organically out of this background of experiences and is music that appeals to listeners seeking original, immersive music with space for reflection and contemplation.
‘Find And You Will Seek’ is a collection of chamber works that explore the combination of piano and strings in new ways. Recent single ‘The BirdSuite II – Praesentia’ is part of a 3-part Suite running throughout the record, written and performed on a custom made “Keybird” piano, which is an una-corda (one string pr note) piano that gives a more subtle and intimate sound. On top of it is a lush and emotional string ensemble arrangement with Ensemble Hermes in multiple layers fluctuating in and out of the keybird piano.
Balvig’s second single from the record is ‘What Happened To The World’, an ultra transparent neo-classical inspired piece, with slow melodic structures, a simple chord progression and emotional performance starting with a floating viola solo. It is written from the feeling that the world sometimes goes backwards, and you feel left on the platform wanting to take the train in a different direction.
From film music inspired pieces to experimental chamber music over piano concerto inspired movements, to more neo-classical productions with almost orchestral sounding dubs of strings, ‘Find And You Will Seek’ flows with emotions and lush sound worlds, always with a tangible organic texture.
Find Christian Balvig and Ensemble Hermes on tour in Denmark:
27.5 Ansgars Kirke (Odense)
28.5 Folkegaarden Festival (Aalborg)
29.5 Gnisten (Ry)
30.5 Musikhuset (Aarhus)
1.6 Basement (Copenhagen)
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