Svala Björgvinsdóttir (born 8 February 1977), professionally known as Svala, Svala Björgvins or Kali, is an Icelandic singer and songwriter. She rose to major fame with her song, "The Real Me" which was released on June 12, 2001 to Rhythmic contemporary radio, from her album of the same name. The singer briefly adopted the stage name "Kali" after joining the

house A house is a single-unit residential building. It may range in complexity from a rudimentary hut to a complex structure of wood, masonry, concrete or other material, outfitted with plumbing, electrical, and heating, ventilation, and air c ...

band

Steed Lord Steed Lord is an Icelandic electronic house trio from Reykjavík, Iceland. The group is made up of three members, Svala, Mega, and Demo. Music career Inception Before the group was formed, singer/songwriter Svala Björgvinsdóttir had become ...

. She represented Iceland in the Eurovision Song Contest 2017 in

Kyiv Kyiv, also Kiev, is the capital and most populous List of cities in Ukraine, city of Ukraine. Located in the north-central part of the country, it straddles both sides of the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2022, its population was 2, ...

Career

Early Fame (1984–1998)

Svala is the daughter of well-known Icelandic singer

Björgvin Halldórsson Björgvin Helgi Halldórsson (alternate names: Bo Halldórsson, Björgvin Halldórsson or Bo Hall) (born 16 April 1951) is an Icelandic pop singer from Hafnarfjörður. He represented Iceland in the Eurovision Song Contest 1995 with the song '' ...

. She started singing at a very young age, being her father's backing vocalist for one of his albums when she was seven years old. The singer also had her first number one hit in Iceland when she was nine years old, when she sang a Christmas duet with her father called "Fyrir Jól". Her second number one hit came out when she was 11 years old, with another Christmas hit called "Ég hlakka svo til". She would also be known for more Christmas songs that became hits in Iceland. Svala studied

ballet Ballet () is a type of performance dance that originated during the Italian Renaissance in the fifteenth century and later developed into a concert dance form in France and Russia. It has since become a widespread and highly technical form of ...

for 7 years with the Icelandic National Theatre Ballet. While studying ballet she was also writing music with her high school band. When Svala was 16 years old she formed the band Scope with two Icelandic DJs and a producer. Their music was very influenced by UK

and

disco Disco is a music genre, genre of dance music and a subculture that emerged in the late 1960s from the United States' urban nightclub, nightlife, particularly in African Americans, African-American, Italian-Americans, Italian-American, LGBTQ ...

. Svala and Scope released a cover of the song "Was That All It Was" in the mid 90s which became a dance anthem and a number 1 hit in Iceland. Svala was quickly signed to one of the biggest record labels in Iceland, Skifan Records, and after releasing a few songs with Scope, Svala left to join the Icelandic indie dance funk band Bubbleflies. She wrote a few songs with Bubbleflies and toured all over Iceland performing originals and

soul The soul is the purported Mind–body dualism, immaterial aspect or essence of a Outline of life forms, living being. It is typically believed to be Immortality, immortal and to exist apart from the material world. The three main theories that ...

and

funk Funk is a music genre that originated in African-American communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of various music genres that were popular among African-Americans in the ...

cover song In popular music, a cover version, cover song, remake, revival, or simply cover is a new performance or recording by a musician other than the original performer or composer of the song. Originally, it referred to a version of a song released ...

s by

Stevie Wonder Stevland Hardaway Morris (; Judkins; born May 13, 1950), known professionally as Stevie Wonder, is an American and Ghanaian singer-songwriter, musician, and record producer. He is regarded as one of the most influential musicians of the 20th c ...

and

Sly and The Family Stone Sly and the Family Stone was an American band formed in San Francisco, San Francisco, California, in 1966 and active until 1983. Their work, which blended elements of funk, soul music, soul, psychedelic rock, gospel music, gospel, and R&B, becam ...

and also releasing a few songs like "I Betcha" which charted on Icelandic radio.

Priority Records (1999–2002)

When Svala was 18 years old she started writing and recording with the Scottish producer Ian Morrow. She was attending college in Iceland but was traveling back and forth to

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

and

Glasgow Glasgow is the Cities of Scotland, most populous city in Scotland, located on the banks of the River Clyde in Strathclyde, west central Scotland. It is the List of cities in the United Kingdom, third-most-populous city in the United Kingdom ...

to write and record music for her debut solo album. In 1999, Svala signed a six-album deal with

EMI EMI Group Limited (formerly EMI Group plc until 2007; originally an initialism for Electric and Musical Industries, also referred to as EMI Records or simply EMI) was a British transnational conglomerate founded in March 1931 in London. At t ...

and

Priority Records Priority Records is an American distribution company and record label known for artists including N.W.A, Ice Cube, MC Ren, Eazy-E, Master P, Snoop Dogg, Mos Def, Silkk the Shocker, Jay-Z, Paris, Mack 10, 504 Boyz, Brotha Lynch Hung, ...

in North America. The record deal was one of the biggest deals ever made with an Icelandic recording artist. After signing she moved to Los Angeles in 2000 and started writing with some of the biggest hit-makers in the music business at that time. Her debut album ''The Real Me'' was released in the fall of 2001 with the title single "The Real Me" which charted on the Billboard top 40 singles chart. After

9/11 The September 11 attacks, also known as 9/11, were four coordinated Islamist terrorist suicide attacks by al-Qaeda against the United States in 2001. Nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners, crashing the first two into ...

happened Priority Records struggled to stay alive and in 2002 Priority Records was bought by

Capitol Records Capitol Records, LLC (known legally as Capitol Records, Inc. until 2007), and simply known as Capitol, is an American record label owned by Universal Music Group through its Capitol Music Group imprint. It was founded as the first West Coast-base ...

and Svala and all the other artists on the label transferred over to Capitol Records. After Svala left Priority Records her album ''The Real Me'' became a platinum selling album in Iceland and was also very well received in Germany, Spain and Japan.

Independent Projects (2005–2009)

The singer returned to Iceland and started writing and recording for her next solo album ''The Bird Of Freedom'' which was released in 2005. It was produced by Svala herself and her father. Svala co-wrote with songwriters from the UK, Scotland and Germany. The album went

Gold Gold is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol Au (from Latin ) and atomic number 79. In its pure form, it is a brightness, bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile metal. Chemically, gold is a transition metal ...

in Iceland and gave Svala the opportunity to show her writing and producing skills. On 8 February 2006 Svala, together with her husband-to-be Einar "Mega" Egilsson and his younger brother Edvard "Eddie" Egilsson, formed the electronic band

. After a few shows in Iceland and with major buzz on

MySpace Myspace (formerly stylized as MySpace, currently myspace; and sometimes my␣, with an elongated Whitespace character#Substitute images, open box symbol) is a social networking service based in the United States. Launched on August 1, 2003, it w ...

, Steed Lord was touring all over Europe and North America and being featured on high-profile blogs, magazines, college radio and

mixtape In the modern music industry, a mixtape is a musical project, typically with looser constraints than that of an album or extended play. Unlike the traditional album or extended play, mixtapes are labeled as laid-back projects that allow artists mo ...

s by DJs in the US. Recognized for their soulful-beat-heavy dance music and very fashionable style, Steed Lord joined the

nu-rave New rave (also typeset as nu-rave, nu rave or neu rave) is a genre of music described by ''The Guardian'' as "an in-yer-face, DIY disco riposte to the sensitive indie rock touted by bands like Bloc Party." It is most commonly applied to a Britis ...

wave. They started to tour more and were remixed by

Crookers Crookers is the musical project of Italian DJ and producer Francesco "Phra" Barbaglia. Crookers was originally a duo consisting of Phra and fellow producer Bot, who worked together from 2003 to 2012. When the two artists met, both were trying to ...

DJ Mehdi Mehdi Favéris-Essadi (20 January 1977 – 13 September 2011), better known by his stage name DJ Mehdi, was a French-Tunisian hip hop and house music producer and DJ. He was signed to the label Ed Banger Records, founded by his friend Pedro W ...

and

Jack Beats Jack Beats are an English electronic music project from London, originally formed in 2007 by DJ Plus One (from the Scratch Perverts) and Beni G (from the Mixologists), both of whom are multiple DJ champions and award-winning DJs. The Jack Beat ...

. In 2006 Steed Lord became WeSC Activists, joining the Swedish clothing brand for all their campaigns. In 2007 they were approached by H&M to design a clothing line which was sold in 52 stores in over 100 countries around the world. On 9 April 2008 the band was on their way to the airport in Iceland to go touring in Scandinavia when they had an almost fatal car crash on the icy road in Iceland. Svala's father in-law was driving the car when another car from the opposite direction lost control and hit them straight on in a head-on collision. Svala suffered broken bones and serious internal injuries. After recovering from the accident Steed Lord joined

Chromeo Chromeo is a Canadian electro-funk duo from Montreal, formed in 2002 by musicians David "Dave 1" Macklovitch and Patrick "P-Thugg" Gemayel. Their sound draws from soul music, dance music, rock, synth-pop, disco and funk. As of 2024, the band h ...

on their US tour. Svala moved to

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

in the summer of 2009. Their music has been featured numerous times on TV shows such as ''

So You Think You Can Dance ''So You Think You Can Dance'' is a franchise of reality television shows in which contestants compete in dance. The first series of the franchise, created by '' Idols'' producers Simon Fuller and Nigel Lythgoe, premiered in July 2005 and has ...

'' and ''

Keeping Up With The Kardashians ''Keeping Up with the Kardashians'' (often abbreviated ''KUWTK'') is an American reality television series which focused on the personal and professional lives of the Kardashian family, Kardashian–Jenner Stepfamily, blended family. It aired ...

''. Steed Lord was hired by brands and companies such as The Standard Hotel and

Universal Music Australia Universal Music Australia Pty Ltd. (UMA) is the largest Australian music corporation. It is a division of the Universal Music Group. Universal Music Australia's corporate headquarters are located in Sydney, Australia. Labels Universal Music ...

to direct and style music videos and brand based content.

Recent endeavours (2015–present)

Svala took a break from music and moved back to Iceland with her husband. In 2015 Svala joined the franchise "The Voice" in Iceland as one of the four judges. Sixty singers were selected to participate in the Icelandic version of the show, which was aired in the autumn of 2015. ''The Voice'' is one of the most popular talent competitions in the world, with over 500 million viewers, and the first edition of the Iceland version of the franchise was said to have been watched by 30% of the population. In early 2016 Svala formed the duo BLISSFUL with her husband and later in 2016 they released their first single "Elevate" which has got over 230,000 plays on Spotify. On August 24, 2017, the band released their second single "Make It Better". On 11 March 2017, she won the Icelandic national selection for the

Eurovision Song Contest The Eurovision Song Contest (), often known simply as Eurovision, is an international Music competition, song competition organised annually by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) among its members since 1956. Each participating broadcaster ...

with her song “Paper,” which she wrote with Einar Egilsson, Lester Mendez and Lily Elise. She performed in the first semi-final of the contest, which took place on 9 May. She failed to qualify for the final. In July 2018, she was featured on the track "Ekkert Drama" with Reykjavíkurdætur. Svala then released "For the Night" and "Karma" under Sony Denmark, as she signed a distribution deal with them in 2018. In December 2018, Svala was featured on the track "Sex" with Baggalútur. On 26 January 2019, it was announced that Svala was returning to Söngvakeppnin as a songwriter with the song "What Are You Waiting For".

Personal life

In 2012, Svala released her debut clothing line Kali which was sold exclusively on the webshop Lastashop. Svala designed four collections for her clothing line which was sold on Asosmarketplace.com

Discography

Studio albums

Singles

References

External links

*
Svala
on

Myspace Myspace (formerly stylized as MySpace, currently myspace; and sometimes my␣, with an elongated Whitespace character#Substitute images, open box symbol) is a social networking service based in the United States. Launched on August 1, 2003, it w ...

Steed Lord
on

{{DEFAULTSORT:Svala 1977 births Living people 21st-century Icelandic singers 20th-century Icelandic singers Icelandic electronic musicians English-language singers from Iceland House musicians Icelandic women in electronic music Icelandic songwriters Icelandic women songwriters Musicians from Reykjavík Icelandic pop singers Icelandic women pop singers Icelandic expatriates in the United States 20th-century Icelandic women singers 21st-century Icelandic women singers Eurovision Song Contest entrants