Tórshavn, Faroe Islands
Elin was born in Tórshavn, Faroe Islands, in 1958. She is a Faroese singer/songwriter/composer, well-known in the Faroe Islands since the seventies. She is a soloist, but has performed with several other artists from time to time – the cowork with Faroese composer/producer Kári Jacobsen being the most well-known, with whom she published their debut album Nalja in 1988.
Elin appeared in 1977 on the first jazz LP ever made in the Faroe Islands “Jazz í Føroyum 1″ (TUTL HJF 1) on the track “Hundasjúku blues” (Hangover blues) composed by Kristian Blak, which is one of the songs that has stayed the longest ever on the Top 15 hit list in the Faroe Islands. The album was recorded in the legendary Faroese music producer Milson Zachariassen’s studio in his cellar.
In the summer of 1977 Elin went on tour in Scotland, Orkneys and Shetland where she was a part of a group of Faroese folk dancers and a folk band. She also performed there on stage herself with guitar player Ívar Bærentsen and bass player Kolbein Simonsen and sang some of her own songs and some of Ívar Bærentsens songs. The concerts were popular, especially in Orkney and Shetland, where all the concerts where sold out.
Since then Elin has participated as a singer (mostly as backing choir) on several music album recordings with various artists. The best known album is “Blátt” by Jákup Marner Antoniussen, where she – among other songs – sang duet with Jákup Marner in the hit song “Tú og eg”. Another duet song also became a hit on the Faroe Islands – “Meg minnist eina mynd” by Hans Andrias Djurhuus, which Elin sang together with Jógvan Telling. She also sang choir on the hit song “Lítli fuglur” by Anfinn T. Hansen. Elin has also sung several popular childrens songs on the Faroese public radio.
In the mid-eighties she was living in Århus in Denmark – for a short while she sang and played keyboards in a heavy rock band with the brothers Kaj & Karl Anton Klein a.o. and participated on a recording (published as MC) with them, of which a couple of songs were composed by her. Elin also conducted a small Faroese choir in Århus at the same time – and a little a cappella quartet, which performed some choral work made by Elin.
Elin made kind of a come-back in the summer of 2010, when the album “Yndisløg” was released. In 2005 she went in to the studio to record music together with her uncle Svenn Brimheim, who was a well-known guitar player on the Faroe Islands, and with the band he played in, Ad Libitum, which was a very popular easy listening folk band on the Faroe Islands. They planned to record a number of other songs later, and the album was intended to be released in 2006, but Svenn unfortunately died in the spring of 2006, before they could make the rest of the recordings. Later – in 2007 – Elin went into the studio with the rest of the band to record the seven remaining song. The album got the title “Yndisløg – Ein ferð aftur í farnar tíðir” (Treasured songs – A trip down memory lane) and contains her, her uncles and mothers favorite cover songs most of them evergreens from the sixties, most of them translated to Faroese by Elin.
Elin has composed her own music all along, although not much of it has been published. November 12th, 2012, the Faroese choir Tarira, led by Sunleif Rasmussen, performed two choral works, composed and arranged by Elin, at the Nordic House, Tórshavn, as part of a larger program at a tribute concert and show for Elin’s father, the late author Jens Pauli Heinesen, in connection to his 80th birthday. In later years she has been working on a musical.
She released her first solo album – “Handan stjørnurnar” (Beyond the Stars) – on July 7th, 2018, the date she celebrated her 60′th birthday (which actually was on June 25th). Elin has written and composed all the songs on the album and she also arranged and produced the songs together with music producer Finnur Hansen. “These are songs, which have been hiding in the drawer for far too long”, as she says. She hopes there will be a follow up soon.
Read more at: http://heinesen.fo
| Title | Performer | Year | Link | Publisher |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Handan Stjørnurnar (Beyond the Stars) | Elin Brimheim Heinesen | 2018 | https://album.link/i/1406252217 | TUTL |
| Yndisløg - ein ferð aftur í farnar tíðir (Treasured songs – A Trip Down Memory Lane) | Elin Brimheim Heinesen & Ad Libitum | 2010 | https://album.link/i/1317126745 | F'LJÓÐ |
| Nalja | Elin & Kári | 1988 & 1998 | https://album.link/us/i/1019759045 | H.C.W.Tórgarð 1988, Tutl 1998 |
