Name: Lindy-Fay Hella & Dei Farne
Nationality: Norwegian
Album title: Hildring By Norse

If you enjoyed this interview wih Lindy-Fay Hella, visit her website www.lindyfayhella.com



Personally, I’ve always turned to music, regardless of whether I’m depressed or happy. Finding something that emphasises those feelings and jumping around and dancing in my own company always helps.
 When it comes to getting hurt by music, I find it stressful to go shopping or being in public rooms if there is “radio pop” going on of the type where auto-tune is used massively. It honestly feels like nails on a board to me and is the reason I do shopping when needed, mostly online. I have left a shop or cafeteria more than once because of the metallic sounding auto-tune.


Music potentially can be a very important tool for many people. For example, in psychiatry, elderly people that are sick and in care homes, children with learning disabilities. However, I think it’s very important that the music is aimed at what the individual actually likes. Let’s say, if a depressed, elderly person loved to dance Foxtrot in younger years, I do not think classical music would have the same positive effect as something up-beat from that time.



Research has been done on people with Alzheimer’s, showing that the part of the brain that holds music memory seems to be intact. This is fantastic! Some weeks ago, I heard a recording done by my beloved aunt Kari, shortly before she died of Alzheimer’s in her late 60s. She loved to sing and recorded herself on a cassette-player. My cousins did not know that she had been recording even when sick, but found a cassette with her singing a song for her grandchildren, also saying something in the lines of “this is the last time I am going to sing this song, so you have to listen carefully.” It was very touching to hear this and her voice was as beautiful as ever. It was not possible to hear in her singing once the Alzheimer’s had taken her.



I often like to use no words, or very minimal sentences. This is because I can have much more freedom in what I lay into the music, depending on my state of mind at the exact time I’m singing, for example at a concert. I feel that a song can be truly healing, but that would not apply to me if I am sad and then have to sing a song saying “I won the lottery today, oh man what luck!”. I would not be able to sing anything like that truthfully and with passion. Also, I think that if you sing or play to someone who actually likes your music, it can maybe be healing since the energy you put into the song is 100 percent honest and heartfelt. 



On the new album, which I co-wrote with Dei Farne, the lyrics on the song “Insect” are inspired by a discussion I had with someone. I was mentioning some birds in the neighbourhood and this person said something like “some people say that birds have no mind, but this is not true. They do, even the very smallest of them have a soul of their own”. I found this sentence tremendously beautiful in a way and wrote the words for the song around that. Also, every time I listen to or sing this song, I get the very same kind of images in my head that’s like a journey through a meadow bathed in golden, yellow light, with insects buzzing everywhere. Personally, I find that healing and soothing.



One thing I've discovered is that there is a link between thoughts/ intention and sound. It is possible to create a good feeling in the body through placement of sound and your own thoughts. It might take a little practice, but it is possible for absolutely everyone to achieve this. Also, I believe it’s possible to share energies that can be positive, through sound. I remember at one concert, I just got a feeling that someone in the audience felt very lonely, so I was concentrating for a moment on trying to send absolutely all the good thoughts to this person, but not in a forceful way, only if wished for. Of course, I have no idea if this was true or not, but instead of trying to be rational and all grown up, I just went for it.



For me personally, spirituality is a form of genuine, good energy, full of love. Everything has an energy within. Also, I am forever curious about what we can’t see, but feel in a way. Sometimes it is possible to get a glimpse of this energy and sometimes it is, in my opinion, possible to get a feeling of this strong energy through music. When making music, I tap into the dream world, more than overthinking melodies, which never works for me. I start with getting into a certain mood and then the melodies just arrive by themselves. The analysing (what to keep, what not), I save for another day.