The second Swedish/British collaboration now has a date!
Get in touch and sign up
ONLY 1 SPACE LEFT FOR JOSEFINA
ONLY 2 SPACES LEFT FOR VICKI
Arrival: From 6th February ’25
Starts: 7th February ’25: after Breakfast
Ends: 9th February ‘25: in the afternoon
Departure: Can be Monday 10th
Cost: TBC
Come with Vicki on a trip to Nyckelharpa HQ in Uppland the famed Eric Sahlström Institute. There will be two classes running at the same time. There will be some time spent together and also at least one session to swap tutors.
The course will run from Friday morning to Sunday afternoon. As the UK contingent will be coming a long way we are able to stay over from the Thursday night – which is what I’ll be recommending. It is possible to get back to the airport on Sunday – but we are also able to stay over until the Monday morning. All at no extra cost! Please note that the accommodation is in shared rooms. If you’d like to share with a particular person, let me know!
Teaching on the whole will be in English – but Vicki is able to also teach in Swedish for her course.
It’s open to nyckelharpa players or fiddlers. It’s open to anyone in the world. Interest is high – so don’t delay in signing up!
Swedish Tutor: Josefina Paulson
Josefina will be teaching Swedish tunes
British Tutor: Vicki Swan
Vicki will be teaching non-Swedish tunes!
The Eric Sahlström Institute is a Swedish national centre for traditional music and dance, with the instrument nyckelharpa as its special endeavour. Through education, long-term projects and performances, they promote and develop the genre across the country and abroad.
This special collaborative weekend will bring together both the Swedish and British communities. Two tutors teaching bringing together their love of one instrument across two cultures in the magical Eric Sahlström Institute in Sweden.
Josefina Paulson: For the past ten years Josefina has worked as a freelance musician and producer touring all over the world with her nyckelharpa, visiting passionate dancers and listeners in Australia, USA, Japan, all around Europe and Sweden. She worsk both as a soloist and in different constellations. Josefina loves traveling in music, culture (and food!) and many collaborations have started out of curiosity for fellow musicians/dancers way of expressing the same thing, in movement and sound and sometimes later resulted in a fusion of our traditions. Some examples of these meetings are the quartet SIRUS (SE/BE/FR), the duo Ciumafina (SE/IT) the trio “the undercurrent” (SE/CAN) and nyckelharpa DUO Näsbom/Paulson (SE)
Vicki Swan studied at the Royal College of Music on the double bass. She also plays the various types of bagpipes, flute, recorder, piano and nyckelharpa. On leaving music college Vicki started down the long path of folk music and was only seen on rare glimpses back in classical orchestras. You’ll find Vicki now inhabiting the troll ridden forests on the hunt for new and exciting tunes from the näcken. Vicki plays not only the standard 3-row modern chromatic, but also the 1408 sienaharpa, the 1526 moraharpa, the 1700s kontrabasharpa and the 1800s silverbasharpa. Over the pandemic Vicki worked tirelessly on a Virtual Music Room to try to help isolated nyckelharpa players remain motivated and focussed on playing and learning.
Getting to the Eric Sahlström Institute
Stage 1 – Getting to Sweden
The closest airport is Arlanda, just north of Stockholm. I tend to choose Ryanair and book a seat for my harpa. Ryanair fly from Stansted. I have a page listing different airlines and their baggage requirements here.
Direct Flights:
London Stansted to Arlanda: Ryanair
London Heathrow to Arlanda: British Airways and SAS
Gatwick to Arlanda: Norwegian
Manchester to Arlanda: SAS
Edinburgh to Arlanda: SAS
One Stop:
Edinburgh to Arlanda via London using British Airways
Edinburgh to Arlanda via Amsterdam using KLM
Newcastle to Arlanda via Amsterdam using KLM
Bristol to Arlanda via Amsterdam using KLM
There seem to be lots of choices on KLM with one stop
Newcastle to Arlanda via Frankfurt using SAS
Stage 2 – Getting to ESI
Train from Arlanda to Uppsala takes roughly 20 minutes and they go every half hour.
The train from Uppsala to Tobo takes about 30 minutes and they go every hour.
It’s a fifteen minute walk from the station to the Institute, but we’ll try to sort out lifts for that final mile!
You can of course hire a car, this takes 56 minutes from the airport.
Other alternatives
Want to take the train?
It’s doable – but takes a really long time! This screenshot is an example from Rail Europe. (London to Stockholm)
Want to drive?
This is also doable – but takes a really long time!
Best route:
Harwich to Hook of Holland on the Ferry (That’s about 6 hours and the ferry goes twice a day)
Let the Satnav guide you the rest of the way
