Sarah Parkman
Sara Parkman is the folk musician who questioned and embraced traditions so unabashedly and thoroughly that she created her own musical universe – and with that became the face of contemporary Swedish folk music. These days, after two acclaimed solo albums, it’s just as natural to hear her music pulsating out over the fog in the summer night forest as it is to see her perform it live on popular television shows. In the autumn of 2022, Sara Parkman returned with Eros Agape Philia - a long-awaited album where the body and love are in focus.
Over the years, Sara Parkman has been awarded several times at the Folk and World Music Festival, awarded Dagens Nyheter's Culture Prize and - as at the Manifest Gala earlier this year - named the year's best live act. As one of Sweden's most interesting artists, she now continues to challenge the traditions of the folk music genre from which she comes from and loves.
On her new album, Eros Agape Philia, Sara Parkman starts from the three Greek words for love. Eros, the romantic or erotic; Agape, the divine; and Philia, the friendly or familiar. From those words, an album has grown – influenced by Sara Parkman's theology studies and biblical readings about love. The album was also influenced by the thinker and mystic Gunnel Vallquist and the philosopher Byung-Chul Han, as well as comic book and TV series, mothers’ good advice, and Sarah’s own love relationships. That is the great thing about loving and being loved.