Music of Sweden: Difference between revisions

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Sweden shares the tradition of Nordic folk dance music with its neighbouring countries, including polka, schottische, waltz, polska and mazurka. The accordion, clarinet, fiddle and nyckelharpa are among the most common Swedish folk instruments. This instrumental genre is the biggest one in Swedish traditional music. In the 1960s, Swedish youth sparked a roots revival in Swedish folk culture. Many joined Spelmanslag (folk musicians' clubs) and performed on mainstream radio and TV. They focused on instrumental polska music, with vocals and influences from other traditional genres becoming more prominent since the 1990s.

Swedish music has also included more modern and pop influences. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Scandinavian death metal bands became very popular with the international heavy metal community. Some of the greatest innovators in the entire metal scene hail from Sweden. Swedish pop bands like ABBA, Roxette, Army of Lovers, Ace of Base, A*Teens, David & the Citizens and The Cardigans have had international success. A number of bands with less emphasis on pop music have come out of the country in recent years, including The Hives, Refused, Millencolin, The (International) Noise Conspiracy, Sahara Hotnights, The Hellacopters, Backyard Babies, Mando Diao, The Soundtrack of Our Lives, The Ark and Kent.

There are also many classic Swedish musicians, including Carl Mikael Bellman, Evert Taube and Povel Ramel (Povel Ramel has composed and sung in a variety of musical styles, from jazz to rap, and he is also often considered both a classical and pop-singer.).

Sweden has been called the third biggest exporter of music in the world, after the USA and the UK. Ironically, ABBA was a much bigger success abroad than in Sweden. Another Swedish artist, DeDe, was so successful in Japan in the late 1990s that she inspired a collectible doll. Sweden have also historically dominated the Scandinavian music scene, with Denmark and Norway listening to music in Swedish rather than the other way around.

"Dansband"

Main article: Dansband

By 1970, the "dansband" culture begun to rise.

Folk songs

Swedish folk song is dominated by ballads and kulning; the latter was originally used as a cow-herding call and is traditionally sung by women, including modern virtuoso Lena Willemark. Ballad stories descend from skillingtryck printed songs from the 19th century. Modern bands like Folk och Rackare, Hedningarna and Garmarna incorporated folk song intro their repertoire.

Folk instruments

The fiddle is perhaps the most characteristic and original instrument of the Swedish folk tradition. It had arrived by the 17th century, and became widespread until 19th century religious fundamentalism preached that most forms of music were sinful and ungodly. Despite the oppression, several fiddlers achieved a reputation for their virtuosity, including Jämtland's Lapp-Nils, Bingsjö's Pekkos Per and Malung's Lejsme-Per Larsson. None of these musicians were ever recorded; the first major fiddler to be recorded was Hjort Anders Olsson. Other early fiddlers of the 20th century included Nils Agenmark and Päkkos Gustaf. There is an extensive traditional repertoire of fiddle-tunes, in forms such as the 3/4 polsk and the 4/4 ganglåt.

The nyckelharpa is similar to both a fiddle and a hurdy-gurdy, and is known from Sweden since at least 1350, when it was carved on a gate in a church in Götaland. During the 15th and 16th centuries, the nyckelharpa was known throughout Sweden, Denmark and in Uppland. The latter has long been a stronghold for nyckelharpa music, including through the 60s revival, which drew on musicians like Byss-Calle from Älvkarleby. The instrument played at this time was not the same as today; August Bohlin and Eric Sahlström made changes to the instrument that made it a chromatic and straight, more violin-like instrument. In spite of these innovations, the nyckleharpa's popularity declined until the 1960s roots revival. The nyckelharpa was a prominent part of several revival groups later in the century, especially Väsen and Hedningarna.

The Swedish bagpipes (säckpipa) has been part of a long-running folk tradition, passed down orally until the death of Gudmunds Nils Larsson in 1949. Later revivalists like Per Gudmundson added a tuning slide and revitalized the instrument.

Accordions and harmonicas were an integral part of Swedish folk music at the beginning of the 20th century, when it contributed to the gammeldans genre. The most famous Swedish accordionist is undoubtedly Kalle Jularbo, who was famous throughout the early 20th century. Later, the accordion was not well-received within the roots revival, until the very end of the 1970s.

Roots revival

In the 1960s, Swedish jazz musicians like Jan Johansson used folk influences in their work, resulting in an early 1970s series of music festivals in Stockholm. The Swedish Music Movement became a popular trend towards jazz- and rock-oriented folk music, including many performers who brought a new vitality to Swedish folk.

Progressive and jazz-rock music

Sweden is also known in some circles for its progressive and jazz-rock musicians, particularly for virtuoso-led acts like:

Sami music

Main article: Sami music

The Sami (Laplanders) of northern Finland, Sweden and Norway are known primarily for highly spiritual songs called joik. The same word sometimes refers to lavlu or vuelie songs, though this is technically incorrect.

Opera

Sweden has a strong opera scene, with the Royal Swedish Opera in Stockholm as its national stage. The best-known Swedish opera singers are the 19th century soprano Jenny Lind, the 20th century tenor Jussi Björling, who had great success abroad, and Wagner-soprano Birgit Nilsson. Also sopranos Christina Nilsson, Elisabeth Söderström and tenors Nicolai Gedda and Gösta Winbergh, baritone Håkan Hagegård, and the contemporary mezzo-soprano Anne-Sofie von Otter are worth mentioning.

Choirs

Sweden has a long tradition of professional and amateur choir singing. A large percentage of the Swedes sing in amateur choirs in various styles. The choirs of Sweden are among the best in the world, with the Radio Choir, owned by Sveriges Radio (Swedish public radio) being one of the world's top professional classical choirs. Some say part of the skill of Swedish choirs can be attributed to the Swedish language, which is said to have a singing quality. Speaking the language helps groom a clear, brilliant voice quality, sought after in a singer.

Hip hop

Main article: Swedish hip hop

While jazz, blues and soul has been around for a long time in Sweden hip hop is a more recent addition, breaking into the mainstream in the early nineties when the eurodisco likes of Rob'n'Raz and Basic Element lost some of their popularity and groups like Just D started to make the genre more accessible to the general public. The Latin Kings were the first representatives of their genre to gain nation-wide fame. They are still popular, mainly due to their designation to the 'Million Programme' suburbs that shaped them and many of their fans. The group rap in Swedish with much of the "Rinkeby Swedish" slang that is typical for immigrant adolescents in Sweden.

The Latin Kings were followed by Blacknuss Allstars and Infinite Mass, both rapping in English, and in 1996, when hip hop got its big break in Sweden, by Petter, another Stockholmer. With him came an array of artists new to the genre, such as Thomas Rusiak, DJ Sleepy and Eye N' I. Other artists that achieved mainstream popularity following Petter's break include Ken and Ayo. Feven, originally from Eritrea, became one of the first women to reach fame in the genre.

Timbuktu is probably the most prominent rapper in Sweden. He is from southernmost Sweden, Skåne and raps in the local accent of his native Lund. Having released five albums he has firmly established himself as a political rapper, borrowing influences from folk music, American blues as well as music from West Africa and Jamaica.

The group Looptroop från Västerås is one of the few groups to have gained international recognition, their Fort Europa Tour included about 100 gigs across Australia, Europe, and North America.

Other acts of the last few years include Promoe, Mange Schmidt, Svenska Akademien, Paragon, Fjärde Världen, Fattaru, Ison & Fille, Organism 12, Ayesha, and Snook.

Rock

While rock is not as widespread in Sweden as pop is, there are some very interesting acts. Worth mentioning are The Hives, Refused, Millencolin, The (International) Noise Conspiracy, Sahara Hotnights, The Hellacopters, Backyard Babies, Mando Diao, The Soundtrack of Our Lives, The Ark, Vains of Jenna and Kent.

Punk rock

The most prominent and important Swedish punk rock band is Ebba Grön (1977-1982) headed by Joakim Thåström. Thåström also had two other bands called Imperiet and Peace, Love & Pitbulls but they were very pop influenced and never became anywere near as popular as Ebba Grön. However, Thåström is still big in Sweden, now as a solo artist.

See also: Umeå hardcore

The most prominent modern Swedish punk/hardcore band are the Refused

Heavy metal and its variants

Sweden is also the home country of many well-respected heavy metal, power metal, death metal, post-metal, Industrial metal and black metal bands, including:

The chip scene

Sweden is one of the leading countries in the world when it comes to chip music, or bitpop. Chip music is music made on old lo-fi 8-bit game consoles, like Commodore 64 or Game Boy, although many different genres can be made with these instruments, and thus "chip music" is not considered a genre by some. The scene is lead by artists like Crazy Q, Coma, Covox, Dubmood, Goto80, Maktone, Random, Role Model, Zabutom, and Machinae Supremacy. There is a chip club in Sweden, called Microdisko.

External links

It's a Trap! Number one, longest running, most visited and first Scandinavian Music ezine.- Established 2002
Joseph Martin Kraus A page dedicated to Joseph Martin Kraus (1756-1792) - "Swedish Mozart", with a list of further links.
Stockholm Studios Info on Stockholm's top music recording studios with links etc.
Music From Sweden A gateway to Swedish music on My Space.
Tack!Tack!Tack! Monthly Swedish Music club in London, UK

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