Beyond My Wildest Dreams | The Eric Sahlström Institute and Beyond

We had the most amazing evening yesterday, beyond anything I had ever imagined doing. I certainly never expected it to happen in this course. Olov invited our class to “open” for Väsen in a concert at the Uppsala Konsert and Kongress (UKK). We played a set of about 7 tunes as people were going into the concert hall, then went up on stage after they had settled in their seats and played a tune. Then Väsen came out and played. They introduced us after their 1st or 2nd tune, when we were seated in the front row. What a dream!

Here we are playing as people went into the concert hall. We are in front of a sign for the Eric Sahlström Institute.

It was a really great concert, a Folkmusikgalan, with three sets of trios, Väsen (Olov Johansson, Mikael Marin, and Roger Tallroth from Sweden, absolutely my favourite group), Dreamers’ Circus (Rune Tonsgaard Sørensson, Ale Carr, and Nikolai Busk from Denmark), and the bluegrass I’m With Her tour (Sara Watkins, Sarah Jarosz, and Aoife O’Donovan from the USA). The Danish and American groups were new to me and were really amazing musicians and such incredibly nice people. What a privilege to hear them and meet them, and they heard us!

Eric Sahlström Institute nyckelharpa students.

Here is our group of 6 students playing our tune on stage at the beginning of the concert. Our two fiddlers had prior commitments and were not able to join us.