New Music
Interview
Sarah Julia: “Songwriting made us closer as sisters”
Get to know the Dutch duo and their goosebump-inducing folk pop
Around the end of the 2010s, sisters Sarah and Julia Nauta wrote a song together they were proud of. Having both grown out of the Dutch musicals, films and TV shows they had starred in as kids, the Rotterdam-born sisters turned their hearts and voices together to see what result as one. After several pages of scribbles shot into the paper bin, Sarah Julia finally landed on some writing that clicked.
That song was ‘Game Of Pretend’, a gently picked number that packs a heavy emotive punch. But since those early days and the track’s release back in November, Sarah Julia have built a burgeoning following with their goosebump-inducing debut EP How Do We Go Back To Being Normal?, as well as spots at showcase festivals like Eurosonic and their first ever headline show at Omeara in London.
Before seeing off the year with a show at Hoxton Hall in London, before they return to the same venue in May 2025, the sisters talked us through their rise.
You were both child actors, tell me a bit about that journey to becoming a singer-songwriter duo…
Sarah: We started pretty young – theatre, musicals, that’s how we started and that was basically because our mum, she was really shy as a kid, and she was like, “Oh I don’t want my kids to be shy, so let’s let them take theatre lessons.” So that’s what we did.
Julia: It didn’t really work, because I’m still shy. It’s genetic.
Sarah: But she tried! And we really enjoyed it, so yeah, thanks mum for that.
Julia: Sarah is three years older than me, so when she started doing that I was like, I want this. You were really a big inspiration for me.
Sarah: Aawh.
Julia: Yeah! Then we did those things separately, and at one point were like, Why aren’t we singing together? Why aren’t we making music together? That was around puberty, I guess.
Sarah: Yeah, because also at one point you’re too tall for children’s parts in musicals, so it’s like, Oh wait, what are we gonna do now? We both really liked music and singing, so we started learning the guitar as well.
Julia: Well, we started off with doing piano and keyboard lessons, but it was the guitar that made us feel like we wanted to write as well.
And when was the first time you wrote something together?
Sarah: That was… 2019.
Julia: Yeah, that was the first time we wrote something where we were like, Oh this could actually be something.
Sarah: Yeah, and actually that song is coming out soon so that’s gonna be really special for us. We were writing before that, but it didn’t really make sense. I think we spent two years writing songs that just didn’t really resonate. It felt like they did and then after a month we would be like, “Oh no this is not really us.”
But it kind of makes sense, because we come from like a musical background, where you’re really used to having a script and people telling you what to do, so I think it just took a while for us to understand that we can really make our own decisions.
Julia: Yeah, and we shouldn’t be listening to other people telling us what to write or what sound we should aim for.
It’s one thing performing on stage together, but I imagine there’s a certain vulnerability to showing each other
Sara: We’ve always been very, very close, but songwriting…
Julia: It made us closer. Especially because around that time we were dealing with a change in our family dynamic and we really went through that together, so I think that made us connect on a deeper level.
Sarah: Yeah. I don’t really remember how it was to first start sharing with you. I feel like we’ve always been doing that, so it wasn’t a big step.
This was around 2019, but you’ve had an especially big year this year, with the release of your debut EP back in April and and just a lot of momentum and touring. What have been some of the the biggest pinch me moments from the last year or so?
Julia: I think our first headline show, at Omeara in London, because it was the first time people had come just for us.
Sarah: And also that wasn’t even in our own country; that was kind of weird, to do your first headline show in a different country, so it’s not like all your friends will be there to fill up the room.
Julia: We did a support tour for Paris Paloma in September, that was really special as well
Sarah: We’re supporting her in North America next year, too! We’re going to be on a nightliner with her and her crew too, which has always been a dream.
You’re based in Amsterdam now, how does it compare to your home in Rotterdam?
Julia: It’s funny, because I went to school there. I went to high school there we, we both grew up in Rotterdam. I did like a preschool for the conservatory there, which was really nice, but I didn’t really feel that the music we make, or I made back then, that there was a big scene for it. So I never really, yeah, I never really saw Rotterdam as a buzzing music city.
Sarah: There is a really good music scene there, but I feel like the music is a bit louder than ours.
Julia: Yeah, I meant our genre specifically. But I really enjoyed growing up there, it’s so different from Amsterdam. The people are very, very different.
Sarah: Most of our friends are not originally from Amsterdam, because people in Amsterdam can be… I don’t know how to say it. It’s the capital, so they have that vibe, you know? People from Rotterdam a lot more chill, a lot of our friends are from there. I’m glad I grew up there, but it also feels like the right time now to live in Amsterdam and to explore the scene here more.
I was asking about Rotterdam, obviously because you’re from there, but it seems like place is quite important to you as songwriters. On the EP you have you take the listener Scotland and Japan. Now that you’ve been to more European cities on tour, is place continuing to be an inspiration for you both?
Sarah: Yeah, because there are so many specific memories for us, I feel like we just really tied the memories to the place, and also to the people, of course. But sometimes it’s easier to connect it to a place, because then you can also just move away from it, when you feel like, oh, it’s been a lot, so you kind of can leave all those memories there and only when you go there you really relive those memories. But we also wrote a song about Amsterdam, haha, we were a bit like, Oh, this is a bit much? It’s too obvious now – you also noticed it! Shit!
In a press release, it says that your your sisterhood is a “source of power” in a male dominated music industry. I’m interested in what your experience of that has been so far in the last year or so, and how being together has helped.
Sarah: Definitely, especially when we were younger as well, we did loads of writing sessions and all those kind of things. And most of the time you don’t really know who you’re meeting up with. So it’s kind of crazy you go to this studio that’s a bit shady, sometimes. so it’s kind of nice to be like, together and to know we’re gonna be fine, because most of the time you just don’t really know who you’re meeting up with. So I feel like that’s been really helpful. But also just when it comes to sound checks, and you have people working there who don’t really take you seriously sometimes. It’s kind of nice to just have each other and be like, ergh, it’s fine, or also to check if you if you feel like something’s off, like the vibe is off, and you can just check with the other, asking if they feel the same way. You don’t like, otherwise, you just sometimes feel you’re crazy.
Julia: You get underestimated very quickly.
Sarah: Yeah, but I do think things are changing, but things take a while.
You mentioned the US tour – what else does 2025 have in store for you?
Sarah: We’re recording our next EP in a couple of weeks, so we’ll release that in 2025. We’re also playing two more shows this year, one in London at Hoxton Hall on 3 December and one at Tolhuistuin in Amsterdam on 11 December. We’re really looking forward to closing out the year releasing music.
Julia: We’re probably going to do some headline shows while we’re in the US as well!
Get to know Sarah Julia and find tickets for their London show on 9 May 2025 here
