Photographed by Sofia Hurtado
Together with Filipino musical artists Ena Mori and Yaelokre, Norwegian musician Aurora opened a portal to a fantasy world at the New Frontier Theater.
It was like different folkloric characters had stumbled into modern-day Manila. An audience mostly wearing lace and long gauzy skirts has gathered at the New Frontier Theater, where they await the performances of Norwegian singer-songwriter Aurora Aksnes, or Aurora for short. The concert’s opening acts: Filipino-Japanese artist Ena Mori and storytelling project Yaelokre, are dressed similarly, the former’s black outfit covered in a translucent frock and the latter’s frontrunner capped in a rabbit hat.
Aurora finally sets foot on stage for ‘Churchyard,’ accompanied by a contemporary dance video of her swaying about with two other ghostly women. Though she shares a name with Disney’s Sleeping Beauty, the singer is more reminiscent of Cinderella at this moment with her blue dress and arm sleeves. The fact that her sister, a costume designer, sewed together the ensemble herself seems to complete Aurora’s fairytale-like persona.
The performer knows she’s been described as ethereal by cultural critics and fans alike, but the description now seems to fall short of her artistic intentions. “It was normal for me to be in the forest and sing, but I guess the world isn’t used to that, even if it’s part of human nature. People were like, oh, this seems very not-human,” she said in an interview before the show. “But also, I think it’s very human to be in the forest, to dance and to be free. I don’t feel magical because of this—I feel more human because of those things.”
Still, an otherworldly shimmer must have tinged the night throughout. Mainly renowned for her vocal prowess, Aurora is also aware of when to wield light spectacles or leave out theatrics. For ‘Infections of a Different Kind,’ the screen is left unused, leaving Aurora to serenade the crowd with just a solo guitarist strumming beside her. When she belts the hit track ‘Runaway,’ the crowd hums along as artificial stars twinkle in the background.
By the show’s latter half, solemn musical arrangements escalate into drum-heavy performances laden with more dramatic imagery. A crescent moon with sleepy eyes blinks at the audience as Aurora howls the lyrics to ‘All Is Soft Inside.’ A video of the singer battling against a clone of herself plays while the real-life version chants the chorus to ‘The Dark Dresses Lightly.’ The concert reaches its climax when Aurora beckons her fans to jump along to the strobing lights and synth beats of ‘Starvation.’
“The drum has been the pulse of emotion for so long. Even the Vikings, who were terrible, had the drums during their wars,” continued Aurora in the interview. “But the purpose of the drum is to be the pulse and the heartbeat of a group.”
After these vivid performances, Aurora simmers down by indulging fans in more playful, spontaneous interactions. Audience members offer the singer a sun hat and a Jollibee plush toy as gifts from her Filipino fanbase, which she accepts with lighthearted giggles. Never one to shy away from weaving political stances such as Indigenous activism and queer liberation into her artistry, the singer prances across the stage while waving a rainbow flag for ‘Cure For Me,’ a song written against LGBTQ+ conversion therapy.
As the show runs into its tail end, Aurora bids goodbye to the audience with a closing reminder about embracing the entire spectrum of human feeling—to joy, to indignation, to grief.
“With pain comes wisdom and knowledge. We start to get familiar with it so we can recognize when people around us are in pain, even when they think nobody can see it,” says Aurora as she prepares to play the piano. “But we can because we know pain. We can even mend parts of ourselves we thought were broken forever and heal. And even when we’re in the middle of healing, working so hard on ourselves, we should still reach out to each other.”
The show finally fades out with ‘Invisible Wounds,’ as if Aurora is humming a lullaby while a lone spotlight lends her a delicate glow. When she sings “How do we learn to tend to / These invisible wounds our homes gave us,” she suspects the audience already knows the answer: not in an escape from reality, but rather in the return to the heart.
