Gunilla Törnfeldt

Gunilla Törnfeldt was born in 1980 in Stockholm, Sweden, and grew up in a musical family with both parents being classical musicians, composers and music teachers. Singing has always been her natural way of expression, but she also early on began playing the piano and later the cello, even though the acoustic guitar replaced the cello in her twenties. Since she studied at the Adolf Fredrik's Music School and was a member of the famous Adolf Fredrik's Girls Choir, early on she had artistic experience of high level musical performance. The love for jazz came as a revelation in high school and she quickly realized where her heart belonged. She studied jazz voice and jazz methodology at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm and graduated in 2008 with a Bachelor in Music and Master of Education in Music.

Over the years she has been featured as a soloist with Monica Dominique Quintet as well as together with Carl-Axel Dominique Trio and different choirs when performing Duke Ellington's Sacred Concerts. She have also been featured with the Laudaensemble and Georg Riedel, Jan Allan and Ove Lundin, for several tribute concerts to late Swedish saxophone player Lars Gullin and performed also the Second Soloist part in several productions of the musical African Madonna. Her Tribute to Joni Mitchell was a returning yearly act at Jazzclub Fasching and in 2006 she got the prestigious scholarship from Friends of Fasching.

In 2007 Gunilla became a member of the jazz vocal sextet Vocation and participated on their second album Just Friends (2008) and toured extensively in Sweden, Denmark and Germany. She left the group in 2010 to focus on her solo career and released her anticipated debut solo album with her own music, lyrics and arrangements - A Time For Everything - in 2009, which received excellent reviews and in 2010 she was awarded a working grant from the Swedish Arts Grants Committee.

In 2012 she founded the jazz vocal group Stockholm Voices with whom she has been touring all over Sweden since the debut tour in 2014. Gunilla is the artistic director and arranger together with pianist and arranger Mikael Skoglund. The group released their debut album Come Rain or Come Shine in 2015 which received exuberant reception in the press and they are now an established and popular act at the jazz clubs and festivals.

In 2015 she participated in the world's first International Jazz Voice Conference in Helsinki and presented one of her methods to practice improvisation, together with other colleagues from all over the world.

Gunilla's current solo project - a jazz quintet with baritone guitar - played their first concert in May 2014 at Jazzclub Fasching and became one of her new platforms for sharing her original music. Behind the Mask is her second solo album and will be released April 10th 2017.

As a teacher she is a permanent member of the faculty at the Ingesund School of Music at Karlstad University and is also frequently invited as a guest lecturer at other music schools and programs.

Awards

2004 Royal Academy of Music 2006 Anders Sandrew’s foundation 2006 Fasching’s Vänners Musikstipendium (Friends of Jazzclub Fasching) 2010 Swedish Arts Grants Committee