• Astrid Selling

    Folk musician and project manager

  • Olympe de Gouge

    20 april 2024 har vi premiär på "Olympes rop på schavotten"

    En nyskriven pjäs av Margareta Skantze

  • Astrid Selling

    My first instrument is the violin, but I also play flutes and kannel, but most of all I sing!

    I come from one of Sweden's smallest regions - Blekinge. It is situated in the very southeast, where the sea trade and the royal Swedish navy have left marks on traditions and culture.

    I have both a Swedish and an Estonian/Russian heritage and try to incorporate this in my creative music life.

  • Astrid Selling

    a musician with a passion for traditional music

    - playing, singing and dancing -

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    Yxna Saga 2023

    Komposition, arrangemang och körledning tillsammans med Elisabeth Ekman

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    Kung Byxlös sommaren 2021

    Komposition, arrangemang och körledning tillsammans med Elisabeth Ekman

  • 2023

    28 Jan - workshop singing games for scout leaders in Skåne

    24 Feb - concert honoring Ukraine. Marinmuseum, Karlskrona

    19 - 23 Apr - KULDRUM storytelling around the Blatic Sea- concerts and workshops in Blekinge

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    2021

    Waiting for new times, when it will be possible again to rehearse, play, sing and perform, I'm digging far down into the archives, looking for ballads, songs, tunes and stories.

     

    21st of May - Meraftan (open singing session for anyone to come along)

    20-24th of June - Jazz & World (a week of workshops)

    17th of June - Culture heritage café, Moderator for a talk with archaeologists

    1st of July - Culture heritage café, Moderator for a talk about handcraft

    15th of July - Culture heritage café, Medieval ballads, together with Marie Länne Persson

    29th of July -Culture heritage café, Margareta Skantze about influential women during medieval times
    4th - 12th of Aug - Kung Byxlös - 5 performances with choir and actor

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    Spring & Summer 2020

    26th of Jan - Bessman, Kulturnatten, Växjö.

    10th of May - ILMA a cappella, Mariedalskyrkan, Karlskrona.

    4th of June - livestreaming solo concert, Musik i Blekinge.

    13th of Sep - ILMA a cappella Jämjö kyrka.
    7th of Nov - Blaustjyng Folksinging Choir, Rappskall project, Ronneby.

    2019

    26th of Feb - Blekinge Folkhögskola, Bräkne-Hoby

    9th of Mar - Café Cura, Karlskrona (Chorus Conspiracy)
    28th of Mar - Litorina Folkhögskola, Karlskrona

    2nd of Apr - Jämshögs Folkhögskola
    2nd of May - Karlskrona - Climate Change exhibition opening event>>

    July - Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania

    3rd of Aug - Skärgårdsfesten, Karlskrona (Chorus Conspiracy)
    6th-8th of Sept Den Olycklige Danske Prinsen, Nyborg, DK. Konsert tillsammans med Jørgen Dickmeiss

    6th of Oct Den Olycklige Danske Prinsen, Saxemara Ship yard
    17th of Nov Den Olycklige Danske Prinsen, Månteatern, Lund.

     

    Summer 2018

    28th of June - Los Angeles - concert and workshop event>>

    2nd of July - Maple Sheyenne Lutheran Church, North Dakota

    7th of July - Butte Brewery Company (private)

    14th of July - Montana Folk Festival, Butte, Montana schedule>>

    15th of July - Montana Folk Festival, Butte, Montana schedule>>

    17th of July - Svenska Kyrkan, Los Angeles. 6.30 pm. Adress: Norske Sjømannskirken, San Pedro. read more>>

  • Kantlåt

    Norwegian, Swedish, Baltic and Russian inspired music
    Astrid Selling, Sylvelin Hege Sevilhaug, Line Arstad Djurberg

  • Singing

    I love to sing and I am a bit of a harmony junky

    ILMA

    A cappella quartet

    Four women with years of experience from different genres sing in four harmonies. Folk music, pop, country and jazz and classical music create our inspiration so collect, arrange and compose music we all love to sing.
    Singers: Astrid Selling, Elisabeth Ekman, Anna L Samuelsson, Christina Wikström Holmgren

    Meraftan

    Folksinging Sessions

    Meraftan is Blekinge dialect and means that specific time in the afternoon when you can have a break with a coffee and a bite. A Swedish expression is fika, and the Brits have their five a'clock tea.

    Meraftan is open sessions and activities than can pop up, with workshops in sining, storytelling or handcraft. It's open to everyone. Watch our inspiring digital/IRL folkmusic festival from July when the neighbour farmer taught us how to call for cows.

    Locus Laude

    Theater trio

    Locus Laude grew from a couple theater performances with Teater Kontur. Three of us decided to keep on singing together, but only music we can find in the old church tradition.

    Koraleriet

    Traditional chorales and hymns

    Nine women in all ages come together and sing a repertoire that is hardly found anymore - the old traditional and local chorales. For us it is a fantastic way to explore co-singing and for churches it has turned out to be an inspiring new repertoire. Koraleriet was active 20

    Bessman

    Traditional singing

    Bessman is a quartet which aims to put the storytelling in focus. The songs we seems to get hooked on are the ones that have been lost in the music archives, that no one has seen for a while. In Bessman we examine tonality and improvisation in action, when the song is actually sung.

    So Seven

    A cappella septet

    After some substantial years of choir singing (Lund Academic Choir - among others) I decided to create a smaller ensemble, which eventually came to become So Seven, which was active for over ten years with a repetoire stretching from Swedish folk songs to pop and jazz.

    Blaustjyng

    Folk singing ensemble

    Blaustjyng is a local dialect word for a sudden wind and is used by elderly in the archipelago of Blekinge in the South east Sweden. And that is where find our repertoire in the local historical archives. The ensemble consists of six singers who do inspiring projects.

    About Sally

    A cappella quintet

     

    About Sally decided to have a theme for the repertoire and together we decided to focus on american folk, bluegrass and country. It was exciting to create arrangements for five female voices and get as close as possible to the genre as possible.

  • Composing and arranging

    I have over the years composed music for nine original theater plays and am now working on the tenth - Olympes rop vid schavotten. To me the music can serve different purposes in a play. It can paint and color the story being more in the background or enhance what is going on on the stage. But I prefer to use the music as a main story teller, just as important as the actors.

    Here are a couple of examples:

    Svart Madonna

    The black Madonna - a choir mass

    The music was created to a story by the author and director Margareta Skantze, where the cycle of life was the format. I composed the music together with Elisabeth Ekman and we incorporated 9 voices, a flute and hand drums into the arrangements.
    Quite soon in the creative process we realized that the story had the same elements as a high mass. This made the music taking on its own existence after the play had stopped performing, and the pieces are still sung by choir now and then.

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    Den olycklige danske prinsen

    The last Danish medieval king

    I created the music for one voice and a kannel. Which then practically takes just as much attention from the audience as the monologue of the sole actor portraying the king.

    The story about the king Christian II shows that history is different in the south from the surroundings of Stockholm. The very south Sweden belonged to Denmark up till the second half of the 17th century. A history that is excluded from the schools' history education.

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    Kung Byxlös

    In the form of a memory, we giot to follow Queen Margaret I's path through life and how she went about bringing the Nordic countries together into a union after centuries of vendettas, wars and fratricide. The folksinging ensemble Blaustjyng simngs everything from folk chorales and church songs to medieval ballads and folksongs.

    Music composed and arranged by Astrid Selling and Elisabeth Ekman. 

     

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    Yxna Saga

    Together with two narrators, the folk music choir Blaustjyng took on a strange Viking myth from Blekinge. About Yxna, the young woman, who is kidnapped and then betrayed by her father. How far can the desire for revenge stretch? Will it ever end?

    Music composed and arranged by Astrid Selling and Elisabeth Ekman.

    Narrators: Erika Silfver and Sarah Hjortsberg

    Scenography and costume: Viktoria Rosén

    Original script: Margareta Skantze

  • Teaching - or rather mediating!

    Workshops, lessons, coaching

    Passing on a tradition

    From generation to generation

    Passing on my knowledge, my tricks, my philosophies about music and tradition is what's keeping me going. Seeing the spark in a youngster that suddenly finds a new music world is always an amazing experience.

    Sharing and including

    Being present

    When working with youth (and adults) I find the most important factor is being present - or actually, making it possible for the attender to be present. For me it is about looking everybody in the eyes, talk to them while working, give them feedback in motion an present images or metaphors that will make them understand or create their own understanding.

  • Where you can find me

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    Musikcentrum Syd

    Managing Director

     

    As a manager at Musikcentrum Syd I get to work with freelance musicians - set up networks, coach strategic communication, create new ideas on how to put the spotlight on our musicians. Read more >>

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    Flokk

    CEO of my own collaborative company

    Through Flokk I can do freelance assignments in music, project management, concept development, strategic communication etc.
     

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    A Cappella South Sweden

    Creative manager

    This is an ongoing singing project for young people in South Sweden. I run it together with Camilla Bengtsson and our aim is to make young people sing more in small ensembles.

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    Teater Kontur

    Musician

    I have collaborated with Margareta Skantze (play writer) and Viktoria Rosén (scenographer) since 1990. Now in the group we call Teater Kontur. Our theater is so much more than a performance, it is also research, seminars, workshops and discussions.

  • Projects

    International and local

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    KULDRUM

    Storytelling around the Baltic Sea

    Started in 2019 and is till ongoing. KULDRUM is Livonian, Estonian and Swedish. Guld/Kuld Rum/Ruum. A golden room - the golden place, physical and spiritual, where people connect and create belonging and identity through storytelling. KULDRUM wants to create a long term network where storytellers and folksingers can share storytelling practices on how to bring in people into creativity, and how to weave culture and identity into the fabric of society and everyday life. READ MORE>>

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    Baltic Sea Inter Cult

    Folk music and youth around the Baltic Sea

    During 4 years I was manager for an international EU-project, an exchange programme with youth and folk musicians in Sweden, Poland and Estonia.

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    A Cappella South Sweden - young singers

    Singing in small groups

    A project supported by the governmental youth department to make young people organize themselves through music. Our goal is to make young people sing in small ensembles.

    Poland and Belarus

    Krusznia

    As a result of the Baltic Sea Inter Cult (BaSIC) project I have visited Suwalki in Poland, to collaborate with other dedicated traditional musicians in Krusznia. Visiting old people in their homes to learn about their life and music.

  • CONTACT ME! 

    Astrid Selling
    Gamlegården, Kamravägen 7
    372 63 BRÄKNE-HOBY
    +46-739-880011