The music I’m crazy about. Part 5: Kantele

Kantele is a Finnish folk instrument. It is plucked string instrument similar to zither. It is made of wood and has strings the number of which varies from 5 to 40. The traditional kantele had horsehair strings but in the modern instrument the strings are metal.

According to the Finnish epic Kalevala the first kantele was built by hero Väinämöinen. He made the body of the instrument from a reindeer bone, the strings were a few hair of demon Hiisi’s horse which were attached to the body with the jawbone of a pike.

Kantele playing consist in plucking the strings with fingers. Nowadays kantele is used not only in folk music but also in other music genres such as heavy metal. When I heard the sound of kantele for the first time I felt in love with it. The two bands I’m listening to which use kantele in their songs are Nest and Kardemimmit. Nest is a finnish band composed by two musicians Aslak Tolonen, who is the kantele player, and Timo Saxell. Their music can be classified as neofolk, ambient and dark ambient.

Kardemimmit is a Finnish quartet composed of female musicians. They play folk music.

Four months passed

In this post I would like to summarize the first semester of this academic year but not only in terms of studying. Since I started writing my blog from the stories of my dreams, in this summary I would also refer to one of my dreams from the past.

In the beginning I should mention that it is my first year in Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań. Previously I studied in Cracow where I had a lot of friends and where I was close to my hometown. Then I decided to enroll to the University of Poznań and I left Cracow. I moved to the new city where I didn’t know anybody, any places etc. All my friends, my family and my boyfriend left in Cracow and Bielsko. Now I’m living in a room the walls of which are painted grey. I like this colour but in combination with the greyness of this year’s autumn and winter it had a negative impact on my mood. The last four months were very hard for me. I had to acclimatize myself to the new reality, new city, new people and first of all to the new university. New subjects and exams proved to be more difficult than ones I had before. And the worse thing was the loneliness, the feeling of longing for my home, friends and of course for my boyfriend who I saw rarely because of the distance. The image of this time reminds me of one of my dreams I had some years before:

"I was alone in the world. The world was an extremely long and wide empty hall with all the walls painted grey, without doors and windows, furniture, equipment, flora and fauna. It has very overwhelming atmosphere. I was walking in that greyness looking for any sign of life and after long time I saw a slight sun beam coming to my world through the window as small as a notebook. There was an old wooden chair and a book on it. I sat on the chair and opened the book. It was an album with photos of my family and my friends. When I saw them I told: You all were always close to me and now I’m alone in this sad world."

It was very depressing dream. During these four months there were some moments in which I felt just like in that dream and that’s why I remembered about it.

Now the new semester started and I hope it will be better. Every day I see more and more sun through my window pane and I hope the spring will come soon. The thing which now gives me the will to live and makes me feel happy is the fact that my boyfriend moved to Poznań and we can see each other everyday!

The music I’m crazy about. Part 4: Joik

Today I would like to present a very unusual kind of music. It is probably one of the most amazing types of songs I’ve ever heard. This is joik (or yoik) a traditional Sámi music. I came across that way of singing about a year ago in Cracow during the meeting with the authors of the book Vaggi Varri. W tundrze Samów which is dedicated to the culture of Sámi people. Their stories and demonstrations made me fell in love with Lapland and thereby with joik. It isn’t ordinary way of singing. Joik is usually dedicated to a human being, an animal or a landscape. It is very often improvised. In the 1950s it was forbidden and considered sinful because of its association with Sámi shamanism. Joiking has a long tradition which lasts until now. I like to listen to joik because of its magical and peaceful sound which makes me feel nearer to the nature and of course because of the language!

Ulla Pirttijärvi is one of my favorite joik singers. She is from Finnish Lapland.

Adjágas is a group of Norwegian Sámi joikers. The name of the band in Sámi language mean the state between waking and sleeping.

Sofia Jannok is a joik singer from Swedish Lapland.

Vajas is another Sámi-Norwegian band. The name Vajas means echo in North Sámi language.

Other joiking artists and bands are: Mari Boine, Máddji, Orbina, Nils-Aslak Valkeapää, Wimme Saari.

The music I’m crazy about. Part 3: Swedish music

Sweden is one of the countries that I like very much. I’ve been three times in Sweden, precisely in Malmö. I have some Swedish friends and I would like to learn their national language. In my opinion Swedish sounds beautiful but it is very difficult language to learn, especially the pronunciation. For now I know only few Swedish words and expressions and in most cases I learned them from music :)

I listen to a lot of Swedish bands and musicians whose music can be assigned to many different genres. Below I present some of my favourite Swedish musicians who sing in their national language:

Veronica Maggio is a Swedish pop singer and songwriter. She was born in 1981 in Uppsala. She has Italian origins. Her discography includes four albums and several singles. Her music is known and appreciated not only in Sweden but also in other Scandinavian countries as Norway, Denmark and Finland. 

Säkert! is a band name of Swedish indiepop singer and songwriter Annika Norlin. The same singer makes also music in English under the name Hello Saferide. She was born in 1977 in Östersund. As Säkert! she released three albums (two in Swedish and one in English).

Laleh is a Swedish pop singer, songwriter, guitarist, pianist and actress with Iranian origins. She was born in 1982 in Iran. She released five albums in which she sings in Swedish, English and also Persian. Recently I heard her songs in polish radio stations. That fact surprised me positively :)

Kent is one of the most known Swedish rock bands founded in 1990. The members of the band are from Eskilstuna. They make music in Swedish and English. They are known not only in Sweden but also in other European countries and in USA. Their discography includes more than ten albums.

Movits! is a Swedish band founded in 2007 in Luleå. Their music is an interesting mix of swing, jazz and hip-hop. They have two albums and some singles. Their album Äppelknyckarjazz is released also in the USA by Comedy Central Records.

Board and card games – that’s the fun!

We are already in 2015. I hope this year will be successful for all of us!

I would like to tell you how I spent the New Year’s Eve because this time it was different than others. This year me and my friends decided not to go or organize a typical party with noisy music, dance and big amounts of alcohol. We met in a group of 7 people in my friend’s house and we brought a lot of board and card games on various topics. These games are our common passion. We spent half the night and half the next day checking our knowledge about the world, exercising the reflex, creativity in inventing stories, language skills, developing strategies and also exercising abdominal muscles by laughter ;)

I really love to play games. It is a good way to spend your free time with your friends, family and also to get to know new people (for example during events dedicated to board games). There are a lot of genres of board games I usually play: educational games, logic games, party games, strategy games, economic games, games of physical skill etc. I’ve never played any RPG (role-playing game) but I would like to try.

It is hard to say which game is my favourite but one of the best games I recently knew is called Dixit.

In this game each player gets some cards with different abstract pictures on them. The first player, called the storyteller, chooses one of his cards and invents a title of the picture. It can be a phrase, a simple word or even a gesture. Then he puts his card on the table face down and tells the title. Other players choose one of their cards which match the cited title the most and put it on the table face down next to the first card. Then all the cards on the table are shuffled and turned face up.

All the players (except the storyteller) guess which card belongs to the storyteller. Who guesses well gets some points. Points are given also to the storyteller if someone but not everyone guessed which card belongs to him and as well to the player whose card was betted. Dixit is very joyful game. It requires a lot of creativity. How about you? Do you like to play board and card games?

The music I’m crazy about. Part 2: Slovenian rock

I love foreign languages. The music which I listen to is connected with that passion. I like listen to many kinds of music in many different languages. Sometimes the lyrics of the song aren’t so important to me. I like to listen to music in foreign language even if I don’t understand what the song is about. It is sufficient that I like the sound of the language and how it fits the music.

One of my favourite rock bands is Siddharta. It is one of the most known Slovenian rock bands. It was founded by four friends: Tomi Meglič, Primož Benko, Primož Majerič and Boštjan Meglič in 1995. In the course of time the members of the band has changed a little bit. Today the band consists of five members: Tomi Meglič (vocals and guitar), Primož Benko (guitar and back vocals), Boštjan Meglič (drums), Jani Hace (bass guitar) and Tomaž O. Rous (keyboard).

The name Siddharta comes from the title of a book written by a German writer Herman Hesse. They play songs in Slovene and English. Here is one of my favourite songs of Siddharta, Napoj:

At the beginning of 2014 the band gave a big surprise to their Polish fans. They recorded the Polish version of one of their biggest hits 'Samo edini' ('Samo jedyny'):

I feel very lucky because I had a chance to know the members of Siddharta in person after one of their concerts in Poland in 2013. Until now I’ve been only at three concerts of Siddharta. I can’t wait to another one and I hope that in the future I will have a possibility to go to their concert in Slovenia. I also would like to learn Slovene. Here is a photo of me and Siddharta’s vocalist Tomi:

The music I'm crazy about. Part 1: Ambient music

I decided to put aside my dreams for some time and dedicate a few posts to music. Recently, during our English classes I presented a podcast which was an interview with Brian Eno. He is an English musician, composer and music producer born in 1948 in Woodbridge.

He is a pioneer of one of my favourite music genres called ambient music. It is an experimental electronic music which as distinct from classic electronic music doesn’t contain linearly developed melodic line and tracks are composed of dispersed composition of sounds. Eno came up by accident with the idea of making music which isn’t a focal event but the surrounding or the background of our everyday activities. One day he had an accident, he was hit by a taxi and he was immobile for some days. He was lying in bed and listening to music but one of his speakers had failed and he couldn’t move from the bed to change up the volume. It was raining outside and the only thing that he heard was a sound of raindrops beating against the window and from time to time some notes of a harp coming from the player. This way he discovered a new way of listening to music.

Why do I love ambient music? I came across this genre for the first time about three years ago. I found it very strange but beautiful music. It is usually very peaceful and relaxing. It helps me to relax and calm down after a stressful day. It also helps me to concentrate during learning and is very inspiring during working on something. Listening to it is like a trip to another place on the world. If you have never had to deal with ambient and want to listen to it for the first time I recommend you to sit comfortably and close your eyes so you could derive more pleasure from that. Here is the first piece of ambient music that I heard and also my favourite one: An Ending (Ascent) from Brian Eno’s album Apollo:

Another ambient music I listen to: Biosphere, Boards of Canada, Tim Hecker, Ous Mal, Clubroot, Amiina.