Sissel Kyrkjebø

Sissel Kyrkjebø (Norwegian pronunciation: [ˈsɪ̀sːl̩ ˈçʏ̀ʁçəˌbøː]; born 24 June 1969), also known abroad as Sissel, is a Norwegian soprano. She is considered one of the world's top crossover sopranos. Her musical style ranges from pop recordings and folk songs to classical vocals and operatic arias.
She rose to prominence in Norway in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and her cover version of Ole Paus' song "Innerst i sjelen" (Deep in My Soul) gained wide popularity in the 1990s. She is well known for singing the Olympic Hymn (Hymne Olympique) at the opening and closing ceremonies of the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer, Norway; for duets with Plácido Domingo and Charles Aznavour at the Christmas in Vienna concert of 1994, José Carreras, Andrea Bocelli, Bryn Terfel, Josh Groban, Neil Sedaka, Mario Frangoulis, Russell Watson, Brian May, Tommy Körberg, Diana Krall, Warren G, Dee Dee Bridgewater, and The Chieftains; and for her participation on the Titanic film soundtrack.
Sissel received her first US Grammy nominations on 6 December 2007 for a collaboration with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. Spirit of the Season, a collection of songs from the choir's 2006 Christmas concert at Temple Square, was nominated for the Best Classical Crossover Album of the Year as well as Best Engineered Classical Album.
Sissel's combined solo record sales—not including soundtracks and other albums to which she contributed—amount to 10 million albums, most of them in Norway, a country with 5 million people. Her albums have also sold well in Sweden, Denmark, and Japan. She and Odd Nordstoga are the only Norwegian artists to have an album go 11 times platinum in album sales for Strålande Jul (Glorious Christmas).
Although Sissel sings mainly in English and Norwegian, she has also sung in Spanish, Swedish, Danish, Irish, Italian, French, Russian, Icelandic, Faroese, German, Neapolitan, Māori, Japanese, and Latin.
In Norway she is mostly known as Sissel Kyrkjebø, her last name meaning "church farm" or "church field". She started using her first name mononymously abroad later in her career.
Sissel grew up in Lønborg in Bergen Municipality with two older brothers, Eirik and Bjørn. She and her parents often took hikes in the mountains surrounding Bergen. In her early years she wanted to be a nurse, but at the age of nine music became her passion.
She joined her first children's choir under the direction of New Zealand-born conductor Felicity Laurence. She stayed with the choir for seven years and said of her experience, "That was my musical education. We sang everything: classical and jazz, folk and even Māori songs. People said we sounded like an angel choir because we had this very clean pure sound, almost like an English boys' choir."
Sissel won her first local talent competition when she was ten. She was influenced by various musical genres; her parents were interested in country music and classical music and her brothers in rock music. She has also stated that Barbra Streisand, Kathleen Battle, and Kate Bush were inspirations.
Her first name "Sissel" is a Norwegian variant of "Cecilia". This is a popular first name from Saint Cecilia, the patron saint of church music. Her last name, meaning "church farm" or "church field", may be derived from an agricultural property owned by or located near the local church.
In 1980, she appeared in the sing-along program Syng med oss (Sing with us) together with a children's choir. Her first solo appearance was in 1984, when she sang the Norwegian folk song "Ung Åslaug". Sissel performed in this program many times until 1989. Her first solo television appearance without the choir was in 1983 on Norwegian television, with the song "Evergreen" in the children's program Halvsju [no]. Later in the same year, she and Rune Larsen, her later manager, guested the television program Husker du? [no] ("Do You Remember?"), hosted by Odd Grythe, in which she performed "Barndomshjemmet" (Childhood Home) and "Sukiyaki".
Her signature song has been "Å, Vestland, Vestland" (O, Westland, Westland) ever since she first sang it on Syng med oss in 1985.
In January 1986, Sissel appeared on the Norwegian television show Kanal 1, hosted by Ivar Dyrhaug. She performed "You Don't Bring Me Flowers", by Barbra Streisand, and later, in February, she performed "Comin' In and Out of Your Life" on the 1986 Alpine Skiing World Cup television show in Norway. In May, Sissel performed "Bergensiana" during the intermission of the Eurovision Song Contest 1986, which took place in Grieg Hall in her home town of Bergen. That was her big breakthrough and in the same year, her first album, Sissel, was released. It sold more than 500,000 copies, making it the best-selling album in Norway at that time.
In 1987, Sissel made her debut on Danish television on Under Uret, hosted by Hans Otto Bisgaard. She performed two songs: "Vårvise" (Springtime), with Danish singer/composer Sebastian, and "Summertime". Later that year, in November, Sissel released her Christmas album Glade Jul (Merry Christmas) with several traditional Christmas carols. It broke her previous record for best-selling album in Norway, and still holds the record. Upon its release, it sold more than 600,000 copies in a country with a population of fewer than 5 million. To date, it has sold approximately 1 million copies. In Sweden, a Swedish-language version was released, called Stilla natt (Silent Night). Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet honored her as "The Name of the Year" in December. Sissel also was invited that year to represent Norway in the Eurovision Song Contest 1987, but she declined, wanting a break from her music career.
She attended a commercial upper-secondary school in Bergen, but in February of 1988 she performed at the memorial concert for singer/songwriter Trygve Henrik Hoff in Tromsø. He had written several of the songs on her debut album, Sissel, from 1986 but died in 1987. In the fall of 1988, Sissel moved to Oslo for a short period to play the role of Maria von Trapp in the Norwegian version of The Sound of Music. This production set box-office records and was seen by over 110,000 people.
In 1989, she released her third album, Soria Moria, named after a Norwegian fairy tale, which sold 180,000 copies. In the summer of the same year, Sissel travelled to the US and performed in New York City on the television program Artists for Our Common Future, which was broadcast around the world, singing "Summertime" and "Somewhere". On a Swedish television concert recorded in Gothenburg, she met Danish comedian and singer Eddie Skoller, whom she later married, at which they sang "Vårvise" (Springtime) by Sebastian.
In 1990, Sissel recorded the singing parts of the character Princess Ariel for the Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish versions of the 1989 Disney movie The Little Mermaid, and played the voice role of Ariel in the Norwegian and Swedish versions. In the same year Sissel visited the Faeroe Islands, developing a project called "Kystland" (Coastland). It resulted in two television programs, Med Sissel til Kirkjubø (With Sissel to Kirkjubø) and the church concert Tidin rennur (Time is Running Out).
In December 1990, Sissel opened the new concert hall in Oslo, Oslo Spektrum, at the Christmas concert Å gi er å se (To Give Is to See) .
In 1991, Sissel toured Norway and Denmark with her very successful church concert Tidin rennur (Time is Running Out). In the fall of 1991, Sissel met and performed with Neil Sedaka on the Norwegian television show Momarkedet, singing Sedaka's song "Solitaire" while he played the piano. He was very impressed, and they collaborated on her next album, Gift of Love, which would come out the next year as her first album featuring only songs with English lyrics. On it Sissel sang three songs written by Sedaka, including a duet with him on "Breaking Up Is Hard To Do".
In the winter of 1992, Sissel made a short appearance at the closing ceremony of the Olympics in Albertville, France. Dressed as a princess and seated on a giant fake polar bear as in the Norwegian folktale Kvitebjørn kong Valemon (White Bear King Valemon), she performed "Molde Canticle" (Molde is the name of the location of an annual music festival in Norway) by Jan Garbarek. She was also named one of the official musicians for the upcoming 1994 Winter Olympic Games in Lillehammer, Norway. In October, Sissel's album Gift of Love was released but sold only 60,000 copies, receiving criticism for her new style. Later that year, she joined Neil Sedaka on his fall tour in Norway and also did several event performances in the US.
In the summer of 1993, Sissel played the role of Solveig in Peer Gynt, by Henrik Ibsen, at Den Nationale Scene (The National Scene) in Bergen, a performance that was very well received by critics. Later, in August, her marriage to Eddie Skoller took place in Mariakirken (St. Mary's Church) in Bergen. Thousands of fans waited in the rain outside the church to get a glimpse of Sissel after the wedding ceremony. The wedding received a great deal of attention from the Norwegian and Danish press.
In February 1994, Sissel performed during the opening and closing ceremonies of the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer. During the Olympics, legendary Spanish tenor Plácido Domingo visited Norway, where he came across one of her earlier albums. He contacted Sissel and the next day they recorded "Fire in Your Heart", an English version of "Se ilden lyse", the official theme song of the Lillehammer Olympics. These two versions of the song were released in February 1994 on Sissel's solo album Innerst i sjelen (Deep in My Soul), a collection of Nordic folk songs. Domingo invited Sissel, along with world-renowned French singer Charles Aznavour, to take part in his annual Christmas in Vienna concert later that year. The concert was broadcast around the world and released as an album internationally.
In 1995, Sissel was invited to perform at the 1995 Live For Peace – Royal Gala in London. In celebration of 50 years since VE Day—the end of World War II in Europe—she performed before Charles, then Prince of Wales and other Royal Family members in the London Coliseum, singing the renowned aria "O Mio Babbino Caro" (O My Dear Papa) from the opera Gianni Schicchi by Giacomo Puccini, and the Norwegian classic "Vitae Lux" (Light of Life) with the choir Gli Scapoli (The Bachelors).
In 1997, Sissel toured the US with the Irish group The Chieftains. They appeared, among other places, on the Late Show with David Letterman and in Carnegie Hall. Later that summer, Sissel was involved in recording the soundtrack to the filmTitanic. The soundtrack, titled Titanic: Music from the Motion Picture, became immensely popular, reaching No. 1 on the Billboard charts and selling more than 30 million copies worldwide. James Horner, the composer of the film's music, knew Sissel from her album Innerst i sjelen (Deep in My Soul) and he particularly liked how she sang Eg veit i himmerik ei borg (I know in Heaven there is a castle). Horner had tried out 25 or 30 singers before deciding on Sissel. She was then scheduled to record the theme song to James Cameron's 1997 blockbuster film Titanic, but Celine Dion's vocals were preferred due to Horner's decision to support Dion's career. In an interview from December 2014, Horner said: "When I had completed the Titanic [movie], I had to decide for Celine Dion or Sissel['s] [vocals]. Sissel I am very close, while Celine I had known since she was 18, and I had already written three film songs for [her]. But that was before Celine was known and filmmakers and marketing people had not done what they should have done for Celine and [her] songs. So I felt I owed her a Titanic chance, but I could [still] have used Sissel there." Instead, Sissel completed much of the film score for the soundtrack album.
Sissel had a No.1 hit across Europe in 1998 with "Prince Igor", a duet with an American rapper Warren G on the concept album The Rapsody Overture, which combined American rappers with European opera singers. She sang an aria from Alexander Borodin's opera Prince Igor during the chorus, while Warren G rapped. When the song was recorded, she had just a half hour to learn the Russian lyrics. She got help from a Russian taxi driver in New York City—whose name, coincidentally, was Igor. Although she had been on her way to the airport, the taxi driver drove her directly to the studio and followed her in. He helped her sing the Russian words correctly while she recorded her part of the lyrics. In the end, he was satisfied and they made it to the airport afterwards.
On St. Patrick's Day that year, Sissel made her second performance on the Late Show, singing "Love, Will You Marry Me?" with The Chieftains.
In 1999, Sissel started working on a new album with producer Rick Chertoff, and travelled between Copenhagen and New York. Although the CD was to be released in 2000, she was unhappy with the results of the recording sessions and scrapped the album. That year she sang the Irish Gaelic song Siúil A Rún on The Chieftains' 1999 album Tears of Stone.
At the beginning of 2000, Bergen was designated as the "European city of culture" and Sissel performed at the opening ceremony. In May, as a part of Bergen's Nattjazz Festival, she performed at a concert at which she sang several duets with jazz singer Diana Krall. In November 2000, Sissel released (in Norway only) her album, All Good Things, which was her first solo album in nearly seven years. Following high sales of 300,000 copies, the album was released throughout Europe and Asia the following year, including a duet with fellow Norwegian singer Espen Lind on "Where the Lost Ones Go" that was also released on his album This Is Pop Music the next year. In early December, Sissel performed Christmas carols and a few of her new tunes at the Festival of Lights (Lysfest) in Bergen, culminating the city's celebration of being the European city of culture and broadcast live online. Later the same month, she was invited to represent Norway at the Nobel Peace Prize Concert, where—after being introduced by Jane Seymour as "the Norwegian star Sissel"—she sang "One Day" and "Weightless", both songs from her album All Good Things.
Sissel also released a greatest-hits collection in Japan that included two new songs in collaboration with Gheorghe Zamfir, a Romanian pan-flutist. These songs were used on the Japanese television show Summer Snow, one of which was the show's theme song. Enormously popular in Japan, Sissel has released several Japanese versions of her albums there.
In 2001, Sissel was asked to sing a duet with the Danish goth rockers Sort Sol (Black Sun). Inspired by the Kylie Minogue/Nick Cave ballad "Where the Wild Roses Grow", she sang with Sort Sol on the track "Elia Rising" from their album Snakecharmer, released in May 2001. She and this group also performed together at Tivoli in Copenhagen and the Roskilde Festival that year—at the latter, before a raucous audience of 50,000 rock fans at 2 am.
Sissel made her debut on the big screen in June, playing a female lumberjack, Inga, in the Danish children's film "Flyvende farmor" (Flying Grandma). In this movie, Sissel sang the Danish song "Himlen over Himmelbjerget" (The Sky above Himmelbjerget). In September, Sissel played two In Symphony concerts in Drammen, Norway, with the Norwegian Radio Orchestra and special guests. The concert was broadcast in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark and was also released as a live CD, Sissel in Symphony, which sold 240,000 copies.
Later in autumn 2001, Sissel toured Scandinavia and sang at a memorial ceremony in October at Copenhagen Airport. Sissel then performed at a memorial concert for a 17-year-old boy, Benjamin Hermansen, the victim of a racially motivated murder in a suburb of Oslo. She also performed at an AIDS/HIV benefit concert in Kulturkirken Jakob (Jacob Culture Church), Oslo, where she sang "Eg ser" (I See). On 6 December, Sissel performed with the Oslo Gospel Choir in Washington, DC, as part of Norwegian Visions 2001.
In May 2005, Sissel performed with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir in Salt Lake City, Utah, on its radio and television broadcast, Music and the Spoken Word, featured on nearly 2,000 stations across the US and around the world. She joined the choir to commemorate the centennial of Norwegian independence from Sweden, which was being celebrated that year. She sang the ABBA song "Like An Angel Passing Through My Room"; "Vitae Lux" (Light of Life); the traditional Norwegian hymn "Herre gud, ditt dyre navn og ære" (Lord God, Your Precious Name and Glory); and the Norwegian national anthem "Ja, vi elsker dette landet" (Yes, We Love This Country) with the choir.
On 8 October 2005, King Harald of Norway made Sissel a Knight of the 1st Class in the Order of St. Olav for her contributions to music and as an ambassador for Norway. She was 36 years old. The ceremony was held on 25 January at the Hotel Bristol in Oslo. In the same month, Sissel was invited to perform in the well-known temple-concert, Ninna-ji Otobutai, in Osaka, Japan, where she sang "Pie Jesu" (Merciful Jesus); "Sancta Maria" (Holy Mary, an intermezzo from Pietro Mascagni's opera Cavalleria Rusticana); "You Raise Me Up"; and several other songs. This concert was aired on television in Japan.
In December 2006, Sissel again joined the Mormon Tabernacle Choir as the featured soloist for its annual Christmas concerts. In four performances, she sang for more than 80,000 people in the 21,000-seat Conference Center in Salt Lake City. The concerts were videotaped for PBS television and aired the year after, in December 2007. She also celebrated more than 20 years in the music industry with the release of a greatest-hits album presenting 40 of her best and most well-known songs, including some never before released. In December she toured Norway with her Christmas concerts, including a mix of Christmas carols and hits from her greatest-hits release that year.
In March 2007, a statistically representative sample of the Norwegian population chose Sissel as the best female Norwegian musical artist in competition with 15 other famous names, including Lene Marlin, Wenche Myhre, Kari Bremnes, and Bertine Zetlitz. In the summer of 2007, she toured Norway, Sweden, and the US with a band but without a choir. According to Sissel, this was a new concert format for her. For the 2007 holiday season, PBS stations aired two concerts starring her as part of the December pledge drive, one with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir titled Spirit of the Season, released on CD and DVD in late September 2007; the other with operatic legend and good friend José Carreras titled Northern Lights, released on CD and DVD in early November 2007. These concert albums have proven to be extremely popular, with Northern Lights reaching No. 10 on the Billboard Classical Crossover list and Spirit of the Season staying firmly planted at No.1 on the Billboard Classical charts for nine consecutive weeks.
The album Northern Lights is a live recording of a concert at Bergstadens Ziir ("Jewel of the Mountain Town" in German), a church from the 17th century in Røros, Norway, a 17th-century mining town. This recording was inspired by Norway's winter, the Blue hour, and the mystical Northern Lights, with music arranged by Kjetil Bjerkestrand.Sharing the stage with Sissel were the Trondheim Soloists, the Nidaros Cathedral Girls Choir, and Sissel's own band and featuring the tenor José Carreras, performing the Julio Iglesias/Dolly Parton-duet "When You Tell Me That You Love Me" with Sissel. She conducted an eight-city US tour in February 2008, singing selections from Northern Lights. A second leg of the tour covered more cities in the central and southern US and lasted through April.
On 9 November 2009, Sissel released a new Christmas album called Strålande Jul (Glorious Christmas), a project with Odd Nordstoga, another popular Norwegian singer. This album presented mostly lesser-known Christmas carols from Scandinavia. Sissel toured in both Norway and Sweden with Nordstoga; The Real Group; Orsa Spelmän; and Krister Henrikson. This album and their sold-out Christmas concerts received much critical acclaim in Norway and Sweden. The record company Universal Music anticipated sales of about 100,000 CDs but ultimately sold more than 400,000 in Norway in the first two months.
In May 2010, Sissel visited China with the Trondheim Soloists, appearing at Expo 2010 in Shanghai. They performed songs like "Jag vill alltid følja dig" (I Always Want to Follow You), "Solveig's Song", and "Wait A While". Parts of these concerts were broadcast on Norwegian television in the summer of 2010.
On 20 September 2010, an unauthorized biography of Sissel titled Sissel by Stig Nilsson was released in Norway. He had written several songs for Sissel earlier in her career. In the book, Nilsson claims—among other things—that Sissel never became a worldwide superstar because she did not want to be. The book has been released only in Norwegian. On 15 November 2010, Sissel released a new album in Scandinavia called "Til deg" (For You), recorded in ABBA's Polar Studios in Stockholm; Nidaros Studios in Trondheim; and Nashville. This album showed a new direction in music heavily influenced by the style of country music, roots, and folk. The album featured five songs in Swedish, three in Norwegian, and two in English, including a Norwegian translation of Victoria Shaw's song "Never Alone" titled "Velkommen hjem", and a Swedish cover of Alison Krauss' song "Ghost in This House" titled "Levande död". Collaborating with Sissel on the new album were Mikael Wiehe, Espen Lind, and Py Bäckman.
In 2011 Sissel moved back to Norway after 22 years in Denmark. On 21 August 2011, Sissel performed the Norwegian hymn "Til ungdommen" (To the Youth), by Nordahl Grieg at the National Memorial Ceremony for the victims of the 22 July 2011 terrorist attacks. This ceremony took place in Oslo Spektrum and was broadcast live in all the Nordic countries. HM King Harald and HM Queen Sonja of Norway attended this ceremony with members from all the Nordic Royal Houses; the prime ministers of Norway, Sweden, and Denmark; and the presidents of Iceland and Finland. In September, Sissel got her own stamp in Norway when a set of stamps of four Norwegian female performers was issued.
In December 2012, Sissel performed exclusively in two free Christmas concerts in St John's Church, Bergen. This was the first time she performed a Christmas concert on her own in that church.
In November 2013, Sissel officially returned to the stage after a three-year break. She appeared on the Norwegian talk show Lindmo, where she performed "My Tribute" by Andrae Crouch. She toured Norway in November and December for her Christmas concerts, with a new mix of Christmas and gospel songs, hiring three gospel singers from New York to back her up on these concerts.
On 17 May 2014, Sissel performed the Norwegian national anthem "Ja, vi elsker dette landet" (Yes, We Love This Land) and Grieg's "Våren" (Spring) on the Norwegian Constitution Day 2014 in Eidsvoll, Norway. Royal guests from Norway, Sweden, and Denmark attended this ceremony, which was broadcast live on television. Later, in September, Sissel performed with the Greek tenor Mario Frangoulis at a concert on 5 September at the Odeon of Herodes Atticus in Greece. This concert, Sing Me An Angel, was held to aid the non-profit organisation I Live For Me. Sissel and Frangoulis performed several duets, including "You Raise Me Up"; "Nights in White Satin"; "Smile"; and "What A Wonderful World". Sissel toured Norway and Sweden with her acclaimed Christmas concerts in November and December. In the fifth episode of Season 3 of American television political drama series The Newsroom, which aired in December, a recording of Sissel singing "Oh Shenandoah" was played over the death scene of Charlie Skinner (Sam Waterston).
In 2015 Sissel performed as vocal soloist at two Titanic Live concerts in Lucerne, Switzerland on 13 and 14 March, and later at the Royal Albert Hall, London on 27 April, where she performed the vocal lines of James Horner's orchestral score as well as the solo soprano for "My Heart Will Go On". A few weeks later Horner died when his single-engine Tucano aircraft crashed in the Los Padres National Forest, California. In December 2015, Sissel was as one of nine persons nominated for the 2016 Hall of Fame at Rockheim in Norway.
The beginning of 2016 saw Sissel performing at a television broadcast Royal Gala on 17 January, celebrating the 25th anniversary, or Silver Jubilee, of HM The King and HM The Queen of Norway's accession to the Norwegian throne. Sissel sang "For alltid" (Forever), written by Ole Paus. She toured Sweden in the fall from 14 to 31 October with her new concert, Songs of Love. In November and December, she toured Norway, Denmark and Iceland with her Christmas concert, Sissels Jul (Sissel's Christmas). In December, Sissel again was nominated for the 2017 Hall of Fame at Rockheim in Norway, and the 2014 PBS concert Sing Me An Angel with Mario Frangoulis was broadcast on television in the US.
In February 2017 Sissel performed at a television broadcast celebration concert for her friend singer-songwriter Ole Paus in the Opera House in Oslo. And in November/December she toured Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and Iceland with her Christmas concert success, Sissels Jul.
In May 2019 Sissel released the first of 50 new songs that came out each week for the following 50 weeks. This new project, named Reflections celebrated Sissel turning 50 years old that year. On 6 June, she performed together with Italian singer Andrea Bocelli at a concert in Oslo. In July, she was again invited to perform with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and the orchestra at Temple Square in their Pioneer Day concert, which was also broadcast on YouTube. In August, she made a special guest appearance on the popular Swedish television show Allsång på Skansen, where she performed two new songs, "Welcome to My World" and "Surrender".
From 1993 to 2004, Kyrkjebø was married to her first husband, Danish-American comedian and singer Eddie Skoller, in a church service described above. They have two daughters, Ingrid (born 1996) and Sarah (born 1999).
On 13 August 2013, Kyrkjebø married her second husband, Norwegian tax lawyer Ernst Ravnaas, in a private ceremony in Hov Church.