Who are Norator?
Norator is Karl-Fredrik Blixt Hagholm and Niklas Rönnberg.
Niklas and Kalle became friends in 1998 via Linköpings Studentspex (English explanation), where Niklas was writing the script when Kalle was an actor. They were later also collaborating as directors.
Kalle
Kalle has grown up surrounded by music due to the fact that his father has worked as, among other things, a music teacher, conductor for Mölndals Kammarkör, and chairman of Swedish Choral Directors Association. He has therefore been involved in music for a long time. The main instrument is the piano, but since early teenage years he has been making electronic instrumental music in the home studio. Since 2002 he has been jamming in the project Studio Symbios (together with another friend from the spex).
His singing career started early on of course, with school choirs, and in his adult years he has been a member of both Linköpings Studentsångarförening Lihkören and Operagruppen Figaro. Through the spex his voice got training with the help of a vocal coach, which of course made the desire to combine his music making with the singing even stronger. Both projects therefore now incorporates vocals in almost all songs.
Musical influences have always been varied and span from Beethoven, through Frank Zappa to Slayer, but synth music, old as well as new, has always had a special place in his heart.
Lyric writing has been a periodic occupation, which has gained momentum through Norator. To write in Swedish gives a greater freedom of expression even if it is harder to write "melodically" than it is in English. Also, it is a clear genre belonging to write about space in Swedish, and a deliberate reference to Adolphson & Falk. The future will tell if Norator will continue with the same subject.
Niklas
Niklas also grew up surrounded by music, which included playing the piano, guitarr, clarinet, recorder, oboe and other "real" instruments. Fairly early on his interest in computers and synthesizers grew. In the beginning of the 80's he began his electronic music career with the Vic-20, then later Commodore 64, Atari ST and eventually PC (first using DOS and later Windows).
From having played different instruments from age nine he has finally found his friends among the synthesizers, with the possibility of creating multiple sounds simultaneously, and foremost the ability to create sounds that are impossible to generate in any other way. Sound engineering has come naturally from working with the synthesizers, and also from working at the student radio station. The sound engineering and synthesizer work has also spawned a strong interest in electronics, which in turn has led to a number of different home-made effects and synthesizers, which are... slightly odd.
Niklas' musical influences have mainly come from the field of classical music (mostly Sibelius and Bruckner), and the early electronic music (like Tangerine Dream, Vangelis and Kraftwerk), but also from the synthpop of the early 80's and more EBM and industrial sounding music.
After having written scripts for the spex for several years, the lyric writing in Norator, along side arranging and sound fiddling, has become a natural part of the music making process.
