Meet ArtEx participant Torje Fagertun Spilde
07.03.2023 / ArtEx has provided the push that my career needed.
Text: Lene Christensen. Photo: Agnete Brun
Talent Norge has supported the electronica artist Torje Fagertun Spilde (25), known as «Third Attempt», through large parts of his career.
“I know it’s going to be good to be taken care of by Talent Norge, in which I have great confidence. It’s been a super mega upturn”, says Torje.
Since mid-2021 he has been part of Talent Norge’s elite programme ArtEx, which provides twelve selected talents with access to mentors, coaches and a broad professional network.
Today he is working full-time as a musician and has released several acclaimed albums.
An awful lot to learn from Bugge Wesseltoft
His dream scenario was to get pianist, composer and producer Bugge Wesseltoft as his mentor at ArtEx. And it happenend!
“Bugge is a great inspiration and we can talk for hours. There is an awful lot more to be learned from Bugge, his way of working and his creative processes, says Torje
“I feel safe and secure with him, he is humble, friendly and curious. Here we have one of Norway’s most acclaimed musicians in his genre, and he is putting himself on the same wavelength as me. I want to be like that too. ”
The mentorship has developed into cooperation between colleagues. Bugge and Torje have performed together, made a track together, and they plan to make a concert in the spring.
“To be part of the ArtEx programme has brought peace and security to my work."
There are many parts of the process that I might never have learned without ArtEx. Therewas an awful lot of learning and development, creatively and artistically, that might otherwise have passed me by. ”
Check out Torjes music.
He joined the talent programme Cloud Exit
ArtEx is not the first time Torje has been in contact with Talent Norge. After upper secondary school (in Norway) he moved to his mother in Tromsø after having made music for several years in his old room at home at Spikkestad. First he made songs for the school leaving celebrations and more music ‘by the book’, but he very soon got tired of it.
“I found out that I had a lot more inside of me that I could explore creatively. I started shaping my own soundtrack, which I’m still doing. It never gets boring. ”
He went to the Insomnia Festival in Tromsø on his own, describing it as an enormously positive experience. That is where he discovered the Cloud Exit programme, which is run by the Festival and is part of Talent Norge’s programme portefolio. Through Cloud Exit he got the electronica artist Charlotte Bendiks as a mentor, and she helped Torje in developing himself as a live artist.
“In 2017 I performed at the Insomnia Festival myself, the year after I had been there as a guest. ”
Charlotte also took him to the hottest clubs in Berlin, and he was able to play there with Charlotte and Per Martinsen. It was during that period that Torje understood that he could actually make a living out of his music.
“In a way I was able to soak up the world. For a long time I thought what I was doing was too restricted.
In close cooperation with an ArtEx coach
Just after Torje moved to Oslo to take a step further in his career, Covid-19 struck. During a press conference on 12 March 2020 all his assignments disappeared for the next six months.
In came his uncertainty again. Was music really something to go in for? But the year after he saw the following question from Talent Norge on Instagram: «Your chance of a lifetime?». They were looking for people to take part in ArtEx, and Torje became one of them.
“It meant an awful lot to me, particularly since I was going through a period of doubt ”, says Torje.
In addition to his mentor, Bugge Wesseltoft, Torje is working closely with Even Lynne as his coach. They have had in-depth conversations about what it is to create and not simply be a musician but an artist.
It does not come easy for the 25-year old to contact people and promote himself, which is often required to get a career going.
“Even has helped me break through the comfort zone”, says Torje.
Last year Torje travelled to England on a study tour with financial support from ArtEx and practical assistance from his London-based promo bureau Unity Agency. When he was there he met a number of artists and people in the industry, which resulted in new musical collaborations and friendships.
Torje hopes to organize one more such trip before his participation in ArtEx is over. His aim is to play more in Europe, and from his studio in the Gamlebyen district of Oslo he is producing new songs all the time. The songs are being released by Beatservice Records.
In addition to Third Attempt, Torje has a nunber of other projects going, including one with Bugge Wesseltoft. He also experiments a lot with Artificial Intelligence (AI) and is fascinated by the way machines and people work together.
“I am now ito take a step into the international world. I have 15-20 new songs that I’m going to push out”, says Torje.
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Programme of Excellence in Performing Arts and film (ArtEx) is an interdisciplinary talent developing programme which is to help top-level artists to further develop themselves artistically and build an interesting and sustainable career. Through the programme you will become part of an extensive national and international network, you will get to take part in interdisciplinary professional gatherings under the auspices of Talent Norge. A support network will be available to you throughout the duration of the programme, consisting of a mentor, a coach and a place on Olympiatoppen’s health service. You will also get an individual scholarship that is to be used for professional development in consultation with your mentor.
