Tag Archives: Manu Delago

Manu Delago and Mad About Lemon share new single, ‘Slow-Mo Moving River’, off forthcoming album

11 January 2024

Photo: reithofer media

A longtime favourite of ours here at CTD, Manu Delago is gearing to release his new album, Snow From Yesterday. A collaborative effort, it saw the staggeringly talented Austrian percussionist and composer teamed up with vocal ensemble Mad About Lemon, the trio of Tyrolean singers Heidi Erler, Mimi Schmid and Anna Widauer, to bring the album life.
With release date just three weeks away, Delago is enticing us again with new single ‘Slow-Mo Moving River’, a song about glaciers with crystalline harps and cracking vocal effects. Speaking about it, Manu comments:

“A lot of people maybe don’t know that they’re actually rivers moving incredibly slowly. So most people think of a glacier as like a steady thing on the mountain that’s fixed or solid, but actually it’s moving but just at an incredibly slow pace. If you look at photos from places or yearly time lapses, they look different every year and they move a few inches. And I tried to do that in the music, the girls from Mad About Lemon were doing a lot of icy vocal sounds using cold sounding words. We also sampled real breaking ice.”

‘Slow-Mo Moving River’ is offered with a visualiser made by Shrey Kathuria. Watch it below and watch out for the album release on February 2nd through One Little Independent Records.

Manu Delago to release new album, Snow From Yesterday, in February

27 October 2023

Photo: reithofer media

We’re already looking at releases slated for 2024 with bated breath and with good reason, as Manu Delago has announced the release of a new album. Entitled Snow From Yesterday, the record saw the staggeringly talented Austrian percussionist and composer join forces with with vocal ensemble Mad About Lemon, the trio of Tyrolean singers Heidi Erler, Mimi Schmid and Anna Widauer. On the upcoming album, Delago continues to explore key current issues he’s spent much of his career addressing, particularly climate change. Snow From Yesterday is “about journeys and the stages of life that may change you, but also links you to others, in other times and other places”, as the press release describes. “It can at once tackle mammoth climate issues, while conveying moments of incredible intimacy.”

We’ll have to wait until February 2nd for the album to be out through One Little Independent Records, but Delago is already enticing us with the first single and album opener ‘Modern People’, a track reflecting on the technology we have today and considering its relevance in 100 years’ time. The single comes with an accompanying video and you can watch it below.

Anoushka Shankar unveils first single from collaborative album, Between Us…, with Manu Delago & Metropole Orkest

01 July 2022

Photo: William Ejam Maail

Four years ago, the Netherlands was gifted with live performances from master sitar player Anoushka Shankar and pioneer of the hang Manu Delago along with the 27-member string section of the Metropole Orkest under the direction of conductor Jules Buckley. We were lucky to be at one those enthralling performances at Le Guess Who? festival in Utrecht, experiencing a cinematic and divine set by two exceptional virtuosos and an incredible orchestra phenomenally conducted.

Now they are releasing a live album recorded during their run of shows in the Netherlands, featuring material taken from Shankar’s four solo albums – 2005’s Rise, 2013’s Traces of You, 2015’s Traveller and 2016’s Land of Gold. Entitled Between Us…, the upcoming album is out digitally on July 8th with a vinyl and CD edition arriving on September 16th through LEITER, the label founded by Nils Frahm and his manager Felix Grimm.

A truly collaborative album blending classical Indian music with contemporary sounds, Between Us… sees Shankar continue to work with other musicians. “I really feed off working creatively with others,” she explained. “Something turns on in collaboration, in chemistry, in connection. It can feel like a dance, like we’re in something together.”

Speaking about long time collaborator Manu Delago, Shankar says:

“He’s just so central to some of these pieces. I’ve played them without him, but my favourite way to play them is with him. I feel a new element of my sitar come alive in that sound vibration that happens between our two instruments, like there’s one little wave I can only play with him. It feels utterly magical.”

Along with the album news, Shankar has unveiled the first spellbinding single, ‘Land of Gold’. Listen to it below.


For another taste of what’s on offer revisit the beguiling performance of Anoushka Shankar & Manu Delago with Metropole Orkest Strings at Le Guess Who?’s 2018 edition, directed by Nick Helderman.

Manu Delago unveils video for new single ‘Trees For The Wood’; new album Environ Me out now

27 September 2021

Manu Delago‘s much anticipated audio-visual album, Environ Me, came out last week and coinciding with it, the staggeringly talented percussionist and composer has shared a fittingly striking video for new single ‘Trees For The Wood’, depicting deforestation. He comments:

“Imagine a musical forest consisting of 20 double basses, each placed on a tree stump in a felled forest with their players behind them. The piece starts with a chainsaw-esque intro, sonically cutting down a tree. But then the track takes a very calm turn with a soothing handpan pattern accompanied by the double bass forest directly recorded in nature.

All musicians involved donated their fees for the project to plant forests instead. These young Elm trees will store CO2 and protect against storms and erosions as they get bigger, while stabilising surrounding coniferous forests that suffer from global heating.”

Watch the video below and grab Delago’s precious Environ Me now that it’s out through One Little Independent Records.

Manu Delago previews upcoming album, Environ Me, with video for new track ‘Liquid Hands’

25 August 2021

Manu Delago‘s Environ Me, an audio-visual album of 12 songs paired with 12 music videos, will see the light of day in just a month. As release day approaches, and after sharing four singles and accompanying films, Delago has unveiled a new track called ‘Liquid Hands’ and a video choreographed by himself and Cornelia Voglmayr. Filmed in a frozen lake, the video for ‘Liquid Hands’ is a drum’n’bass choreography for 8 hands featuring Delago, Charly Mair, Chris Norz and Jakob Köhle. Watch it below.

Environ Me is out on September 24th through One Little Independent Records.