Artist:Choir of Young Believers
Song:Under the Moon
Album:This Is for the White in Your Eyes/Burn the Flag
Here's another example of a solo artist giving himself a band name. This is usually done to preserve anonymity but I don't think that's true in this case. The man behind Choir of Young Believers was Danish guitarist Jannis Noya Makrigiannis from Copenhagen, Denmark. He was in the band Lake Placid. They released an album in 2004 and then split up. Makrigiannis moved to the Greek island of Samos to work on his own music. When he returned to Copenhagen, he brought in musicians to record the 2007 EP Burn the Flag followed by the album This Is for the White in Your Eyes. They got airplay on Danish radio. Choir of Young Believers won Best New Act at the Danish Music Awards. They played the 2009 SXSW music festival and that led to a US record deal with indie label Ghostly International. They released This Is for the White in Your Eyes in the US in 2009. The music is folk rock with cello by Cecille Trier. You'll see her in the video clip. Why the band name? Well, Makrigiannis is a long name so that was probably a good idea. The album Rhine Gold was released in 2012 followed by the 2016 album Grasque. Makrigiannis wrote and produced everything himself and brought in musicians to play on his albums and formed a band for touring. The music was critically acclaimed. But it's not commercial music. So they had potential to build a cult following. Burn the Flag and This Is for the White in Your Eyes are on one budget CD. Sadly Makrigiannis got sick and after releasing the 2022 album Holy Smoke, Makrigiannis died on Dec. 30, 2022. Here's Choir of Young Believers performing Under the Moon for Seattle radio station KEXP Oct. 23, 2009.
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