Anna Mieke is set to bring her sumptuous folk stylings to Whelan’s this November. The Wicklow artists second album ‘Theatre’ featuring the singles ‘Twin’ and ‘For A Time’ is set for release this November 18^th.

 “It’s a song of humid heat, burning summer, a pool. Rotting fruit, flies, the density of a greenhouse in August, carpeted stairs, a diving board. But also loss, and that feeling of fading and forgetting, of passing on,” explains Anna Mieke of ‘For A Time’,m the second glimpse into the album. “It reflects that feeling of nostalgia for a time you never actually experienced, or a person you never had the chance to meet, but feel you know well.”

Of the video, she adds: “I wanted to depict some sort of character or creature moving through, but at odds with, its surroundings—blending in and disappearing at times, mirroring back the landscape around it. Hence the Disco Yeti that you see in the video, who let us follow them around for a day.” Theatre is now available for pre-order.

“Perhaps the music enables some form of dreamlike movement towards an imaginary place,” Anna Mieke says considering ‘Theatre’. “I’m just creating a sound world to escape to, built from moments in time. I hope it reminds someone else of their own experience…memories of youth infused with an intense warmth, like that childhood sensation of summer.”

Theatre was written in Wicklow, during residencies in a house by the sea just west of Ireland, and in a barn at a former school in Hyrynsalmi, Finland. It was eventually recorded over three intense 4-5 day periods at Dundalk’s Black Mountain residential studio and features contributions from Ryan Hargadon (saxophone) Brían Mac Gloinn (violin, harmonium), Alannah Thornburgh (harp), Cora Venus Lunny (viola/violin), Lina Andonovska (flute) and This Is The Kit’s Rozi Leyden (bass).

 “I really think collaborating made a big difference in the way I approached songwriting,” says Anna. “It became more intentional, cohesive and meaningful. I thought this would be a solo, pared back album, but as I wrote, I imagined it as something much bigger, more spacious. Some people tell me listening to my music makes them picture a landscape, or moving through a landscape…I guess I like that idea of my music giving a feeling of an expanse, of openness.”

Anna Mieke at Whelan’s Dublin, Friday 25th November 2022. Tickets €18.50 (including booking fee) on sale Monday 15th August at 10:00.