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Written in Folk Roots issue 166, 1997

ERIK BJÖRKMAN & SVÄRDSJÖ SPELMANSLAG
Erik Björkman - Svärdsjö Spelmanslag
Giga GCD-33 (1996)

HJORT ANDERS OLSSON
Hjort Anders Olsson
Giga GCD-22, 23, 24 (1996)

VARIOUS ARTISTS
Musica Sveciae - Spelmän från fem landskap - Fiddlers from Five Provinces
Caprice CAP 21487 E (1996)

VARIOUS
Musica Sveciae - Prillarhorn & Knaverharpa - Nordic Folk Instruments
Caprice CAP 21484 E (1996)

Sweden, like Norway and Finland, is, compared to, say, England, well provided with CDs of what might be described as “raw” traditional music - straight recordings of players or singers, largely solo, either from old recordings or new-recorded.
      While some of these Nordic recordings are made available by collaborations between national radio and a record label (as in the case of NRK/Grappa’s Norsk Folkemusikk set), or by national institutions such as Finland’s Kansanmusiikki-instituutti or Sweden’s Rikskonserter (the home of the Caprice label), some are the work of essentially one-person companies, such as Hallvard Kvåle’s Heilo in Norway (recently taken under Grappa’s wing), Timo Närväinen’s Olarin in Finland, or in Sweden Anders Rosén’s Hurv or Mats Hellberg’s Giga.

      Giga’s steady stream of releases devoted to major fiddle stylists continues with recordings made by fiddler Erik Björkman (d.1986) both solo and with Svärdsjö Spelmanslag, which still plays many of the tunes from Björkman’s Svartnäs tradition, and a triple-CD boxed set of absolutely every available recording by the famous concert spelman Hjort Anders Olsson, from the cylinders of 1934 to the shellac discs of the year he died, 1952, and including re-takes and mistakes, since it’s felt that even they tell us something of the man and his playing.

      Meanwhile the Caprice Musica Sveciae series rolls on. Fiddlers From Five Provinces consists of fresh-sounding recordings made between 1958 and 1960 of Gotland fiddlers Svante Pettersson and Sigvard Huldt (Pettersson solo and both in very elegantly arranged and smoothly played duet), Carl Eric Berndt and Richard Isacsson from Skåne playing, again very precisely and tightly arranged, not only standard fiddle but clog fiddle (made, yes, from a clog - “excuse me, Mr. Kennedy, is that a genuine 1648 Dr. Scholl?”), nyckelharpa player Eric Sahlström from Uppland, whose skill and enthusiasm were major factors in turning around the decline of the instrument and creating today’s strong upsurge in playing, another tight duo Erik Öst and Theodor Olsson from Hälsingland, and Gustaf Jernberg from Gästrikland, solo and with his son Herbert.

      Nordic Folk Instruments has a tune played on just about every traditional instrument from Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Finland, by leading players from each country, largely solo, but also, to show present-day ensemble uses and accepting progress in what might be described as a traditional instrument, includes a track each from Frifot and Garmarna. Apart from these, and one from hardingfele player Hans W. Brimi, the material comes from the previous vinyl release of the Musica Sveciae series, so in some cases techniques have already evolved further, but it’s a useful guide to the sound of each instrument and the sort of thing it can do.

      The Giga albums have notes in Swedish and English; the version of the Caprice releases distributed to English-speaking countries (denoted by an “E” after the CD number) has notes in English.


© 1997 Andrew Cronshaw
 

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