The Artist Explains: André Barros ft Myrra Rós - 'Reynir'
Selftaught composer/pianist André Barros gives us some wonderful insight into the ideas behind his poignant music video and single 'Reynir' ft Myrra Rós.
Taken from the album, 'In Between', 'Reynir' is an introspective and devastatingly beautiful 4 minutes 40 seconds of emotional, cinematic pop. The track and visuals both combine grief and sorrow with healing. This is seen through joining the deepest emotions of the human condition with an exquisite use of existential metaphors depicting the phenomena's of nature, transforming the pain, sadness and loss into something rather cathartic and life affirming.
Where was the video for 'Reynir' filmed?
The music video for this song (featuring the vocals of the wonderful icelandic singer-songwriter Myrra Rós) was entirely shot in a beach known as "Praia Velha", which is situated in the coastline city of Marinha Grande, Portugal (approximately 140 kms north from Lisbon). Marinha Grande is also my hometown city! We chose this beautiful place not only because the script obviously needed a beach as the chosen location, but we went for this particular place due to its undeniable beauty and its gorgeous steep slopes and long cliffs by the ocean! Hopefully, it really helped to convey the feelings we were aiming for!
How does the video compliment the song?
'Reynir' was named after the grandfather of the singer (Myrra Rós), who she is longing for and passed away some time ago. The lyrics that she wrote are dedicated to him and we wanted to convey this sense of longing and nostalgic feelings. In that sense, the video was thought to portray the metaphors used in the song. Having said this, we hope that listening to 'Reynir' becomes a much fuller experience if accompanied by this clip, thus helping the viewer to engage quicker and easier to the message and story we intend to tell with the song in the first place. The video became, therefore, a dramatic visual extension to the music, objectively telling the story behind the lyrics.
Any behind the scenes stories?
Shooting in the beach, in plain summer, is always tricky due to how quickly we get tired by moving all the equipment from one side to another and walking under the blazing sun... Nonetheless a funny story we have has precisely to do with the algae I've mentioned above... Picture the people passing by and enjoying their beautiful sunny day at the beach and watching, in full surprise, a poor girl getting tossed with algae right next to the ocean while the film production team guys are piloting a drone on top of her head and all the other crew standing around!.... It was quite funny to deal with their reactions!
Tell us about the ideas/ themes/ imagery used?
When we start the video, we come across with desolation, sadness and solitude... with a hint of despair. This seems to be the result of a wreckage, and we see this sort of a cast away girl (hence the the metaphor with algae and the driftwood). Here, we intend to portray how we feel as the result of losing someone we love. Then, we introduce flashbacks of what seems to be her and her late grandfather, memories of how they used to walk on the beach and how close and happy they were (along the video there are hints to lead the spectator into knowing who the characters are and how they relate to eachother). We "quickly" go through the feelings of anger, despair, mourning and longing, throughout the clip, as the older girl slowly remembers all the good times spent and how he (her late grandfather) used to give her strength by saying "there's an ocean ,Your eyes" (as in the lyrics of our song), telling her to always believe in herself. We then soon sense a shift and realise she somehow overcomes the pain to start appreciating how lucky they were and how important for him it would be if she stayed positive and happy, no matter the challenges in her life. She finally accepts the passing away of her grandfather and shows gratitude towards him and the life they shared together.
What is the message you hope people take away from watching the video?
We honestly hope the entire work (music and video) conveys the message of how important it is to surpass the pain and the consequent anger one feels when losing someone we love in a positive way. I'm sure that if we could ask to someone who we lost, what would they wish for us who stay after they are gone, they would surely tell us to be happy no matter what and live our lives the fullest. This is the message we would like to convey to our wonderful listeners.