Vocalist and drummer Mari Boine (Persen) infuses the enduring shamanistic practices of northern Scandinavia’s Sami population with fresh contemporary energy. Her rhythm-driven compositions draw directly from the wordless, yodeling-inflected tradition of yoik while weaving in jazz, rock, and additional global influences. Following her emergence during the 1980s, she achieved wider recognition through the 1989 release Gula Gula and confirmed her stature with the Spellemann Prize-winning Goaskinviellja in 1993. Subsequent projects such as the live recording Eallin from 1996, Eight Seasons in 2002, and In the Hand of the Night in 2006 preceded major honors that included the Arts Council Norway’s Honorary Award in 2009 and the parallel Spellemann distinction in 2017, the year she issued her debut all-English album See the Woman. In 2023 she returned with the intimate Amame, recorded alongside pianist Bugge Wesseltoft.
Born to a Sami family, Boine encountered the devotional psalm singing associated with the Laestadian Christian movement during childhood. The prejudice she faced as a young person regarding her heritage shaped a songwriting perspective centered on themes of discrimination. Her first album, Jaskatvouda Manna, appeared on the independent Norwegian imprint Iduit, yet her commercial ascent arrived with the 1989 album Gula Gula, which Peter Gabriel’s Real World label distributed. The 1993 set Goaskinviellja (Eagle Brother) earned a Spellemann Award in the Open Class category.
A 1994 commission to create and present original material for the Vassajazz Music Festival supplied the core for Leahkastin (Unfolding), issued the next year. Meanwhile her voice featured on saxophonist Jan Garbarek’s Twelve Moons (1992) and Visible World (1995). Invited to appear at the 1996 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer, Norway, Boine declined, rejecting the prospect of serving as a “token ethnic ornament.” That same year Eagle Brother and Unfolding were merged for the compilation Radiant Warmth, and she released the concert album Eallin. The studio effort Bálvvoslatjna: Room of Worship followed in 1998.
In 2001 Boine joined Inna Zhelannaya and Sergey Starostin for Winter in Moscow and issued Remixed on NorthSide Records, featuring reinterpretations by contributors including Bill Laswell and Jah Wobble. Eight Seasons surfaced on the same label the following year. She concluded the decade with In the Hand of the Night in 2006 and Cuovgga Áirras/Sterna Paradisea in 2009, both issued by the Universal subsidiary Lean, and received the Arts Council Norway’s Honorary Award that year. Gilvve Gollát: Sow Your Gold, her first project of the 2010s, earned a Spellemann nomination in the Traditional Music/Norwegian Folk field in 2013. See the Woman, her inaugural English-language album, appeared via MPS Records in 2017, the same year she accepted the Spellemann jury honorary award. Amame, a 2023 collaboration relying on minimalist support from Norwegian jazz pianist Bugge Wesseltoft, marked her most recent release.
