Hania Rani
Hania Rani is an award-winning pianist, composer and singer. Her debut album ‘Esja’, a beguiling collection of solo piano pieces was released to international acclaim in 2019, earning Rani four prestigious Fryderyk Awards including “Best Debut Album”, “Best Alternative Album” and “Best New Arrangement”, in recognition from the Polish music industry’s very own Grammys.
Her sophomore album, the expansive, cinematic, ‘Home’, was released in 2020 and finds Rani expanding her palate: adding vocals and subtle electronics to her music as well as being accompanied by bassist Ziemowit Klimek and drummer Wojtek Warmijak.
Hania’s third studio solo album ‘Ghosts’ was released on October 6th 2023, and features Patrick Watson, Ólafur Arnalds and Duncan Bellamy (from Portico Quartet) and was made with the help of Viktor Orri Árnason (string arrangements) and Greg Freeman (mixing). ‘Ghosts’ was mastered by John Davis at Metropolis Studios.
“With ‘Ghosts’ I wanted to start something from scratch, picking tools and stories I was not familiar with, but which felt dear to me. ‘Ghosts’ is a story about life and death, light and darkness, real and unreal. It’s an attempt to touch ultimate qualities and craft my own mythologies; to face fears, take a deep dive into things that scare me but also seduce me subconsciously. ‘Ghosts’ collects all of these things together, mixing the past, present and the future into a new sound of mine.”
Follow-up ‘Nostalgia’ is Rani’s first ‘real’ live album, recorded in a place of deep personal and artistic significance: the Polish Radio studios in Warsaw. Through Nostalgia, Hania presents the studios in her own perspective, as somewhere unique and unknown. A place of work, but something more. A place of ghosts and hidden meanings, of inspiration and mystery. By juxtaposing her music with evocative analogue photographs of the studios, Rani provides a closer look at her artistic journey – from composing to performance and recording – all seen through her own eyes. For Rani, it is an experimental step – the first time she brings her sonic and visual worlds together in a combined presentation.
Hania’s upcoming album, original music for Joachim Trier’s Cannes winning, Golden Globe nominated ‘Sentimental Value’, is a deeply intuitive collaboration, composed before a single frame was edited. Intriguingly Hania worked on the score for Sentimental Value without an edit in hand; instead, she was given a carefully written script and the freedom of her own substantial imagination.
The story told in the film oscillates around three characters and the motionless presence of the house, yet the relationships between all these personalities are not fixed, but in progress. Those subtle qualities were at the center of her attention and became the core topic of numerous discussions with Joachim about the music, the film, and the philosophy behind Sentimental Value.
Sentimental Value is released on 30th January.