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For five decades, Norwegian folk icon, Jonas Fjeld, has enjoyed chart-topping commercial success and elder statesmen respect—he’s regarded as the “Doc Watson of Norway.” Jonas is a prime Norwegian musical export with an international profile celebrated in a recent PBS special. This September the Norwegian Rock N’ Roll Hall of Famer turns 70, and, lately, he’s been enjoying his biggest successes to date.

Jonas’s last album, Winter Stories—a collaboration with music icon Judy Collins—topped the Billboard Bluegrass for four weeks; and was nominated for the Spellman Prize (a Norwegian Grammy). In addition, a live performance documentary from the Winter Stories tour earned a Bronze at the New York Film Festival. 

Today, Jonas follows these milestone achievements with the elegant but earthy folk album, To The Bone, out September 16th, 2022. The album will be his first solo album sung in English since 1999. Prior to it, Jonas was concentrating on acoustic music sung in his native language. “I never thought I would release another English album,” he emphasizes. “But things went so well with the previous album’s reception and the shows, I decided what the hell? Let’s do a new album!” Jonas continues: “The expression ‘to the bone’ means honesty, and this is a very honest album. I feel at home on this album.”

Jonas is a masterful musician with a poetic “everyman” sensibility. His journey in music began in rock n’ roll and punk before he discovered a musical and spiritual home in roots music traditions. Jonas found that American roots music spoke to his soul, and, much like the blues exchange with America and England in the 1960s,  Jonas sought out authentic yet innovative U.S.-based collaborators. In the 1990s, he worked with country-rock legend Rick Danko of the Band and folk singer/songwriter Eric Andersen in the trio Danko/Fjeld/Andersen.

In 2004, he sought out NC Americana adventurers Chatham County Line for fresh music explorations. Since then, Jonas and CCL have formed a brotherly artistic alliance, tirelessly touring internationally, and releasing four collaborative albums.  Their pairing has earned them acclaim, awards, and a fervid fanbase.

His latest solo album, To The Bone, is a modern folk masterwork flush with hard truths and sweet optimism. The album’s tastefully-adorned acoustic folk features dashes of rock n’ roll, soul, and blues. Most of the songwriting on the album is a collaboration between Jonas, and hit-making and critically-acclaimed American country singer-songwriter Hugh Moffatt. The pair worked together through Jonas passing along music demos to Hugh with him singing syllabically. Jonas’s demos though wordless, were so keenly expressive Hugh was able to intuit Jonas’s intended emotions. In addition to Hugh, other album lyricists include Dave Wilson, Jim Sherraden, Karen Pell, and noted Norwegian author Arne Svingen who collaborated on the Norwegian song “Vi veit aldri.”

The soulfully impressionistic opening track, “Dust In My Wallet,” features fiddle, whistle, and other folk trimmings, and is a modern hard-luck troubadour’s tale. The story goes that Hugh empathically understood Jonas’s sketch of the tune about the pandemic, and its toll on a working musician’s livelihood. Punchy horns and warm Memphis-style organ accompaniment lend “I Can Dance” a silken soul-folk feel. Jonas paints a pastoral folk portrait on “Rosie,” and sings sweet vintage country on the harmony-lavished “Simple Love.” The stately piano ballad, replete with strings, “Sansa's Wedding Song” might be the first time Game of Thrones is referenced on an Americana album. On “Vi veit aldri,” the album’s closing track, Jonas tips his hat to his beloved home country with some joyfully brisk bluegrass sung in his native language.

Jonas has spent his life literally and figuratively traveling dirt roads seeking out the essence of folk music. To The Bone gets to the core of his journey, and the mystique of the folk tradition. “I remember my dad had these great 78s, and those songs…[he sings] ‘I was born to wander and roam…’ they got inside me,” he says. “This music is where I belong.”