Politiken (DK) ****

Church organ, like you’ve never imagined it before

The new album from bass singer Jakob Bloch Jespersen is wild and uplifting despite all its words about death, destruction, and emptiness.

Singer Jakob Bloch Jespersen has always enjoyed operating in the more absurd end of avant-garde music, as he does on his new album.

Worsaae’s shipwreck is accompanied by the most insane effects, minor-key density, and even barking dogs

Step into the Church of Our Saviour in Copenhagen and you’ll see the large pipe organ towering high above the church interior. Silent, unless there’s a service. If you stare at it long enough and examine it from all sides, you might begin to think it resembles a giant ship sailing somewhere between life and death.
That must be what happened to composer Nicolai Worsaae, whose fantastic, performative, and absurdly boundary-pushing work “Shipwreck” forms the climax of a highly unusual album.
If you’re open to seeing things from a new, skewed angle, you should give it a listen.
It’s the Danish bass-baritone Jakob Bloch Jespersen who, with his dry, clear voice, invites you into an hour and fifteen minutes of deep, slow sounds. The themes are death, despair, darkness, and transience.
But listen anyway. Strangely, there is something uplifting about the album “And I Gave My Heart …”, where Worsaae’s shipwreck and slow drowning, of a gasping organist and a wheezing organ, are accompanied by the most peculiar effects and minor-key richness. Along with barking dogs, scratching, snorting, and the sound of sirens reverberating through the church’s silence.

Heavy drumbeats
It’s not that Jakob Bloch Jespersen and the organist of the Church of Our Saviour, Peter Navarro-Alonso, are making fun of the serious content.
But with the organist’s own adaptation of music originally from an opera project by the late composer, critic, and self-proclaimed “failed pessimist” Pelle Gudmundsen-Holmgreen as an introduction, “And I Gave My Heart …” becomes an intense bass experience, featuring an organ in slow motion and heavy, inevitable strikes on a bass drum.
This is organ music and church singing, but not at all as you would imagine it.
It is a kind of musical drama built around the great organ in the Church of Our Saviour, whose former organist Jens E. Christensen has also played a significant role in the conception of the music.

The singer drowns
Bloch Jespersen is well at home in the Gudmundsen-Holmgreen universe—absurdist and inspired by Beckett, where hymns turn into dark prophecies. At the center of this simultaneously hard-hitting, grotesque, and deeply serious album are nine “Erotic Hymns” by Bent Lorentzen, where the pietist Brorson’s sensual Jesus-eroticism meets Ole Sarvig’s modernist existentialism.
But it is Gudmundsen-Holmgreen’s seven “Solomanden” songs and Nicolai Worsaae’s brilliant shipwreck, for church organ, chanting organist, and a desperate singer, that make “And I Gave My Heart …” an experience worth treating yourself to.
From the first deep “ahh” to the final waves of organ sound that drown the singer in Worsaae’s musical shipwreck, set to words by hymn writer Simon Grotrian. Thomas Michelsen April 10th 2026

Original Danish text

Kirkeorgel, som du aldrig nogensinde havde forestillet dig det

Nyt album fra bassangeren Jakob Bloch Jespersen er vildt og opmuntrende trods alle dets ord om død, ødelæggelse og tomhed.

Sangeren Jakob Bloch Jespersen har altid været glad for at færdes i den mere absurde ende af avantgardemusikken, som han gør på sit nye album.

Worsaaes skibskatastrofe følges på vej af de mest sindssyge effekter og molfylde foruden hundegøen
Går man ind i Vor Frelsers Kirke i København, ser man det store kirkeorgel med de enorme orgelpiber højt oppe i kirkerummet. Tavst, når ikke lige der er gudstjeneste. Kigger man længe nok og undersøger det fra alle sider, kan man ende med at synes, det ligner et kæmpeskib, der sejler et sted i rummet mellem liv og død.
Det må være det, der er sket for komponisten Nicolai Worsaae, hvis fantastiske, performative og absurd grænseoverskridende værk ’Shipwreck’ er kulminationen på et meget usædvanligt album.
Er du frisk på at se tingene fra en ny, skæv vinkel, skulle du give det et lyt.
Det er den danske bassbaryton Jakob Bloch Jespersen, der med sin tørre, klare stemme inviterer dig til en time og et kvarter i en verden af dybe, langsomme lyde, temaerne er død, fortvivlelse, mørke og forgængelighed.
Men lyt alligevel. For mærkeligt nok er der en masse opløftende ved albummet ’And I Gave My Heart …’, hvor Worsaaes skibskatastrofe og langsomme druknedød for gispende organist og rallende orgel følges på vej af de mest besynderlige effekter og molfylde. Foruden hundegøen, kratten, prusten og lyden af sirener, der flanger kirkerummets stilhed.

Dumpe trommeslag
Det er ikke, fordi Jakob Bloch Jespersen og organist ved Vor Frelsers Kirke Peter Navarro-Alonso laver sjov med det alvorlige indhold.
Men med organistens egen bearbejdelse af musik, der stammer fra et operaprojekt af den afdøde komponist, smagsdommer og selvudnævnte ’mislykkede pessimist’ Pelle Gudmundsen-Holmgreen, som intro er ’And I Gave My Heart …’ en vild basoplevelse. Med orgel i slowmotion og dumpe, uafvendelige slag på en stortromme.

Det her er orgelmusik og kirkesang. Men slet ikke, som du ville forestille dig det.
Det er en form for musikdramatik bygget op omkring det store orgel i Vor Frelsers Kirke, hvis tidligere organist Jens E. Christensen har haft mere end en finger med i spillet, hvad musikkens undfangelse angår.

Drukner sangeren
Bloch Jespersen er godt hjemme i det gudmundsen-holmgreenske, absurdistisk Beckett-inspirerede univers, hvor salmer bliver til dystre profetier. Fyldt i midten af dette på samme tid hårdtslående, groteske og dybt alvorlige album er ni ’Erotiske salmer’ af Bent Lorentzen, hvor pietisten Brorsons kødelige Jesus-erotik møder Ole Sarvigs modernistiske eksistentialisme.
Men det er Gudmundsen-Holmgreens syv ’Solomanden’-sange og Nicolai Worsaaes geniale skibskatastrofe for kirkeorgel, chanterende organist og desperat sanger, der gør ’And I Gave My Heart …’ til en oplevelse, du skulle unde dig selv.
Fra det første, dybe ’ahh’ til de afsluttende orgelbølger, som drukner sangeren i Worsaaes musikalske skibskatastrofe med ord af salmedigteren Simon Grotrian.