Many of us went to Oktoberstämma in Uppsala, this year with an amazing concert celebrating 25 years of the group Väsen, my favorite group.
Oktoberstämma is an annual gathering of folk musicians and dancers numbering usually about 1300. It takes place on a Saturday in October and lasts from noon to 1 AM. It is an amazing hubbub of concurrent concerts and dances in 4 venues in a big concert hall, plus informal jamming in the many hallways and corners of the very large building like a conference center.
I participated in a 20 minute concert by this year’s Eric Sahlström Institute musicians, 6 out of the 9 of us. We then were joined by about 14 former students for Härjedalsschottis. (I got to announce this tune and the additional people coming on stage. I managed one sentence in Swedish!) After the schottis we exited and the former students’ group played for 35 minutes, then we joined again for a final tune. It was a really fun experience and went well.
After that I went around to various events, found things to eat, and with my nyckelharpa walked around and found a group or two to join that were playing tunes I knew. There was a Boda polska workshop with way too many people. There is the old joke about the dance venue in Boda with the Boda Spelmanslag, that there is only room for forsteg (the beginning step where you walk forward), not for the turn. It was almost true of this dance workshop.
The Väsen concert was beyond wonderful. The concert hall was full of people (it holds 1100 people) and excitement. First Olov Johansson, Roger Tallroth, and Mikael Marin came out and played a series of favorite tunes, then they began inviting guests to join. It was so interesting to see and hear their drummer André Ferrari, who doesn’t travel or tour, and see and hear tunes that I hadn’t seen them perform in the 4 concerts I have seen in the US as a trio. They were also joined by LinnéDansarna, a wonderful group of 6 dancers, two of whom I know through the ESI. Additional guests were JPP (Finland), Lena Willemark, Norrbotten Big Band, and Trio X. They also showed video tributes from various folks. The overall happy feeling was palpable.
I felt very privileged to be in the audience (5th row!) for this concert. And very privileged to now know Olov Johansson and be studying with him almost every week this year with a small group of 9 musician-students. Olov is such a wonderful musician and teacher and human (as are our other teachers, Ditte Andersson and Sonia Sahlström).
Oktoberstämma allspel and audience
View of Väsen concert from my seat. Olov is wearing a striped shirt (of course!).
View of Väsen concert finale from above
Concert flyer
https://www.facebook.com/events/267995080066239/?pnref=lhc.recent
http://ukk.se/Konserter/Kalendarium/2014/Oktoberstamman/
These links above have information about the events.
Hi Sonia ,
You definitely gave us a good picture of the recent concert and staemma as well as your own concert. I am impressed at your determination and the fact that you got up on stage at the most recent event with Vasen. It must have been very exciting to be there. I was hoping to come to Sweden for the event, but it was not practical for us at present. What fun that Ginny Lee joined you for the ESI concert! Keep playing and having fun, much love from Jill and Peter xxx
It’s actually not a joke…maybe it’s not always like that, but during the week of Musik vid Siljan, I danced maybe 4 bodapolskor in Boda, and got a total of maybe 3 turns. All the rest was försteg. I decided I’d just as soon sit and listen….or participate in the stämma going on outside!