Sophie Galet
© Pascal Schyns - www.pascalschyns.com Born in Belgium to non-musical parents, Sophie mostly grew up in the countryside. From a very early age, she showed a keen interest in nature and music, as she wanted to be both a singer and a forest ranger. Still today very partial to long walks in the forest, she spent her younger days sharing her time between the children’s choir and winding woodland paths.
At 12 years of age, she acquired a guitar, wanting to accompany herself. Instantly a series of sad songs was born; children’s songs in fact. As a teenager, confronted by parental pressure to follow so-called ‘normal’ studies, Sophie, still with a desire to make music, got involved in various local ‘rock’ groups, before forming her first group ‘Standard’.
Her passage into adulthood was punctuated by a series of difficult events, including the accidental death of her father, which led to a long period of sadness and soul-searching, delaying any focus on her own songs from one year to the next. In 1992, after studying Graphic Art, she spent a year in London where she perfected her English. This period of contemplation gave birth to a series of tracks, some of which were later reworked on her first album Cyclus. With its pop ballads and intimate songs, this acoustic album, rich in 70s sounds (Rhodes, Wurlitzer) gave Sophie the opportunity to express her talents subtly as she wrote 4 and co-wrote 5 of the 13 tracks on this first adventure with Benjamin Schoos (Miam Monster Miam) as artistic producer. This album met with enthusiastic Belgian press and was critically acclaimed as a first self-production.
After lending her voice to albums by Miam Monster Miam (Hey Tank! Forgotten Ladies, Soleil noir and L’Homme Libellule), Jacques Duvall (Hantises, Le Cow-boys et la Call-girl, Expert en désespoir), Juan d’Oultremont (Bambi is dead) and Guillaume Ledent (La récréation), out of pure pleasure, Sophie has regularly improvised as a multi-instrumentalist; one minute on the penny whistle, the next on the guitar and finally, straddling a drum in a leopard print suit in the Garage Punk band Ufo goes Ufa ... (Pop Symphony Garage II) and she always seems ready to push the limits of improbability in the pursuit of her happiness! And she finds her happiness within a mishmash of crazy concepts and serious, sober and gentle compositions. Uncompromisingly, Sophie sits in between two chairs, both uncomfortable, but fully occupied; on one side lies her fragility and melancholic songs, and on the other, her inner strength and spontaneous enthusiasm.
2011 and Sophie has finished putting together Stella Polaris, a new collection of frail and majestic songs, suspended in time. This folk album is unworldly but at the same time has its feet firmly on the ground and is always balanced by her sensitive French vocal that wavers between grass roots and ethereal. Accompanied in the studio by Raphael Laforgia (Guitar), Pierre Greco (double bass), Jérôme Dantinnes (drums and keyboard), Pascal Shyns (electric bass), Georges Herman (piano), Benjamin Schoos (electric guitar and synth), Philippe Laurent (trumpet), she recorded 11 songs in one week at Studio 5 in Liège with Raphaël Wynands and added the finishing touches at home. This new album was mixed in France at the Farside studio by the illustrious Gilles Martin and will be released in September on the independent Belgian label Freaksville Records.
With regards to her live performances, Sophie is both restrained and spontaneous which adds to her charm and gives her a presence that is not easily forgotten. Surrounded by talented sidekicks (Raphaël Laforgia, Pierre Greco and Jérôme Dantinnes), she chose them as kindred spirits and for their genuine likeability. Her concerts are intense, with a variety of powerful emotions that touch upon many subjects as ‘simple’ as love, life and death… with poetry that helps her inner turmoil take flight.
|
 RELEASES
 Format
SG01CD/DIGITAL2006
RELEASE
10-04-2006
 Format
FRVR32CD/DIGITAL2011
RELEASE
10-10-2011
 Format
SG02DIGITAL2011
RELEASE
14-03-2011
|
