Singer-Songwriter Klara Kjellen

Hey, it's Justin here for another Sofa Showcase! Let me introduce you to a student from Sweden, Klara Kjellen, pronounced Shillean – I can't pronounce it! I met her over 10 years ago when she came to the United Kingdom to do singing lessons and guitar lessons.

🎧 Listen to Klara Kjellen on Spotify! :)

I've been following her journey as a songwriter ever since! At the time of recording, Klara was about to release a new album, and one of her songs (These Woods) had just appeared in a Volvo advert!

How Did I Write The Fingerstyle Part?

We chatted about the fingerstyle guitar I used on the song we played today, Playground House. I decided to use a capo for this tune because the D and F#m chords feel awkward for me. With a capo on fret 2, the chord shapes change to the key of G. This makes fingerstyle loads easier.

Interestingly, it was tricky for me to find a nice Em chord for the pattern. I played the note A over the G chord, which sounded great. So I decided to play it over the Em, even though it's a strange note. And it sounded wicked! If it sounds good, it is good.

As for the chorus, I played the Em as a barre chord, leaving the thinnest string open. I repeated that trick for the D chord and did something similar on the C. That little change made these chords spooky and quirky.

With the picking, I ensured my thumb was consistent and found melody notes that worked. Fingerstyle is about the sound, not patterns or formulae.

For this tune, we decided that two fingerstyle parts were too much. It's tricky to make that work. So I played fingerstyle, and Klara played simple chords. It sounds awesome!

Klara's Songwriting Tips

As well as recording herself, Klara learned a lot from working with my guitar player on pre-production. She did a lot of demos at home before recording in a fancy studio. Klara highly recommends collaborating with other musicians, whether drummers or bass players and taking ideas from them. I agree! There is a fine line between great and terrible, and playing with someone else helps us decide if our work is the real deal or not.

📝 Songwriting doesn't have to be a mystery. We break it all down in my Songwriting Course!