Scandi Course 8th of November

Last week we learnt two tunes from Hälsingland. The first one was a waltz I learned from fiddler Bertil Westling, who has been one of my most important influences in learning folk music. It's a tune he learnt from his father Bernard and there are a number of version of it played in different parts of Sweden. You can see Bertil play it together with his son Göran here, and look at another transcript with bowing details here (will take you to a pdf). The second tune was a polska composed by Eiwor Kjellberg from Järvsö. With its arpeggio figures in the B-part this polska is in a style very closely associated with Hälsingland. These polskas are especially connected with the Hälsingland fiddler Jon Erik Öst who travelled around the country in the first part of the 20th century performing a style of virtuoso polska that soon became very popular among fiddlers. Here is an example of one of Jon Erik's compositions called Skansenpolskan. His son Eric was also a very good fiddler who played both older and more modern dance music. He used to be a regular on entertainment shows on television and radio. Here is a recording of Eiwor playing her Polska i Moll, I've added a variation to the melody which may work better on if you don't play the violin.