Knäck Mig en Nöt / Knack Mig en Not

Dave Frishberg is known for his humorous compositions, best heard featuring the composer at the piano and singing. Yet this unusual Swedish outing finds him playing piano for eight Swedish jazz singers, who interpret his songs as translated into their native language! To English-only speakers, something is obviously lost in the translation, though the Swedes do lapse into English at times (either to set Frishberg's American fans at ease, or a good translation doesn't exist for the words). At times, Frishberg plays a chorus alone, before repeating the full song on the following track, joined by the singer. While all the vocalists have good voices, they don't match the humorous inflections within Frishberg's lyrics as well as he does. One surprise guest is avant-garde jazz/post-bop vocalist Karin Krog, who duets with the composer in "Dear Bix," with Frishberg singing a chorus in English, Krog the next in Swedish, then they finally join forces in the final verse (in English, of course!). Whether or not this CD will get English speakers interested in learning Swedish, it should still be of interest to Dave Frishberg's fans.