On 24 October 2025, Sámi poet and musician Niillas Holmberg and Emma award-winning saxophonist and composer Pauli Lyytinen published their long-awaited first collaborative album, Naarattu laulu ('song dragged to shore'), via Eclipse Music. 

The joint sound of Niillas Holmberg and Pauli Lyytinen takes listeners to landscapes where the waterline on the shore rises and falls.

Whales' song, gods' garment!

Where are we while a poet and a saxophonist are dragging a mythical song to dry land? Which waters are we looking at? The world that Niillas Holmberg and Pauli Lyytinen raise with the help of poetry, yoik, saxophone, percussions and live electronics is built on the simultaneous presence of centuries, dreams and wakefulness.

What if you grow up by the Lake? 

The whalesong will not rise to those waters.

The duo’s musical realm is built on channelling, improvisation and listening to each other intensely. Their art is not a product called Naarattu laulu; it is a verb. Art is not a single catch, but an act where a net woven together retrieves something timeless from the hazy water.

The collaboration between Holmberg and Lyytinen began in 2021, and the duo has since performed at numerous art, literature and music events in Finland, Germany, Italy and Norway. Eclipse Music published the duo's first album, Naarattu laulu, on 24 October 2025. BBC3 made a 30-minute radio documentary, Ohcejohka, on Lyytinen and Holmberg’s artistic identity, which aired in Between the Ears on 2 November 2025. 

From the beginning, Holmberg’s poetry has been one of the basic elements of the project. Gummerus published Holmberg's new poetry collection, Naarattu, on 6 October 2025.

How water carries sound.

Quotes from reviews:

"Naarattu laulu shines in its yoik and instrumental sections, but also gives a pleasant taste of Holmberg's poetry."

– Suvi Tuomisto, Suomen Kuvalehti 11/2025

“While I listen, I think about where the lyrics end and where the music begins, who listens to whom, and where the interaction takes us. Pauli Lyytinen improvises, composes, experiments and – is at home in the northern river valley and in poetic symbolism." 4.5*/5*

–     Marja Mustakallio, Kulttuuritoimitus 11/2025

“The soundscape, combining yoik, the sounds of water and Nordic-style clear but free jazz and guiding them towards bursts of saxophonic art, initially feels safely exotic to a cynical urban listener. As if the sharper edges of Sámi culture shown in the book Naarattu were wrapped up as a Christmas present along with woolly socks." 4*/5*

- Vesa Rantama, Helsingin Sanomat 12/2025

"The men are an amazing duo, listening marvellously to each other. Their dialogue works and tunes the audience in to listen to lyrics, yoik and instruments.”

– Sari Jaatinen, Raahen Seutu 7/2024