Artist:Laufey
Song:I Wish You Love
Album:A Night at the Symphony
Laufey is an Icelandic singer songwriter who is having success today as a 40s style pop singer. She's had success mostly in Europe. But she's making inroads in the US. She is on tour now. She has had success on the Jazz chart but her music is not jazz. Her music is aimed at an older audience who don't listen to current music. She was born Laufey Lin Bing Jonsdottir Apr. 23, 1989 in Reykjavik, Iceland. Her father is from Iceland and her mother is Chinese and comes from a musical family. Her twin sister is her creative director. Laufey learned piano and cello as a child. She graduated from the Reykjavik College of Music in 2018. She was playing cello for the Iceland Symphony Orchestra when she participated in the 2014 edition of what we will call Iceland's Got Talent and she was a semi finalist on the 2015 edition of The Voice Iceland. You guys know how much I love those shows. Excuse the sarcasm. Laufey was supposed to study economics. But instead she studied at Berklee School of Music in Boston with cellist Mike Block. She graduated in 2021 and now lives in Los Angeles. Laufey released a single in 2020 and then an EP in 2021. That's when she first recorded the song I Wish You Love written and originally performed by French singer Charles Trenet. That EP Typical of Me was listed as an album of the year by American Songwriter magazine. Posting jazz standards on TikTok got her more attention and a record deal from AWAL which stands for Artists Without A Label. Kobalt Music founded AWAL and it's supposed to be like Shanachie and similar labels where the artist owns the recordings. The tradeoff is those labels don't spend money on promotion. The problem is Kobalt sold AWAL to Sony. Supposedly AWAL still operates the same way. The difference is the artist has access to the Sony machine. This deal likely would not have gone through if Sony tried to change too much. Then Laufey signed a publishing deal with Warner Chappell Music. A good introduction to Laufey's music is this 2023 live album A Night at the Symphony with the Iceland Symphony Orchestra. It's kind of a greatest hits album available as a digital download. Laufey has done well on Jazz and Classical charts. Her 2025 album A Matter of Time reached #4 on the Billboard 200. Producers Spencer Stewart and Aaron Dessner of The National moved the emphasis from jazz to singer songwriter. There were no hit singles so some adjustments may be necessary. It remains to be seen how far Laufey will go to be a mainstream success. Here's Laufey performing I Wish You Love with the Iceland Symphony Orchestra 2023.
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