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Written in Folk Roots issue 186, 1998
 

OTTO HOTAKAINEN
Polkka-Otto
Kansanmusiikki-instituutti KICD 57/SKSCD 2 (1998)

VARIOUS ARTISTS
Järviseudun Viulumestarit
Kansanmusiikki-instituutti KICD 49 (1998)

VARIOUS ARTISTS
Könni And The Gypsies
Kansanmusiikki-instituutti KICD 50 (1997)

Otto Hotakainen (1908-1990), of Halsua, south-east of Kaustinen in Finland’s Central Ostrobothnia, had an unusual fiddling style - he held the fiddle low on his chest, and to reach high and low strings instead of angling the bow he rolled the fiddle itself. He was a lively, expressive fiddler and writer of memorable dance tunes. His tunes and playing are sometimes reminiscent of springy Québecois fiddling, particularly when accompanied by Ostrobothnia’s characteristic key-pounding harmonium. Polkka-Otto, compiled by his son, Tallari fiddler Risto Hotakainen, from recordings made between 1969 and 1980, consists of ten of his tunes and fourteen traditional, largely polkkas, plus masurkkas, jenkkas, a sottiisi and a waltz, played solo or with harmonium or kantele.

      Most of Finland glistens with lakes. Ostrobothnia is less well endowed with them than some other parts of the country, but it has quite a few. Järviseudun Viulumestarit, meaning “Violin Masters of the Lake Region”, is a collection featuring solo fiddlers and fiddle-and-harmonium dance music groups from the villages of Kortesjärvi, Evijärvi, Alajärvi, Lappajärvi and Vimpeli, to the south of Kaustinen. Recorded between 1935 and 1988, the 51 tracks include mainly Finnish polskas (much more rhythmically straightforward than Swedish polskas) and polkkas with the occasional march, waltz, masurkka and sottiisi, and there are several differing versions of the most popular tunes.

      Marus Baltzar was only 13 when she sang for the late Professor Erkki Ala-Könni’s microphone in 1972. Her single track on Könni And The Gypsies is magnificent, husky and assured in its slides and vibrato, giving the song its due. Finnish Gypsies tend to have a distinctive way, not too far removed from that of, say, Scotland’s Belle Stewart, a swooping vocal style coupled with a cherishing of the song and of singing itself, and the older songs usually have a characteristic Phrygian cadence - a semitone rising note before dropping back onto the last note. Here also are newer-style Gypsy songs which draw on Finnish and Russian rhyming song, and also popular songs and hymns (including an almost Hawaiian-feeling version of Just A Closer Walk With Thee), in Finnish and occasionally Finnish Romany.


© 1998 Andrew Cronshaw
 

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