Friday, February 20

5:30pm Doors Open

6:00pm Twin Cities Nyckelharpalag

6:30pm ASI Lilla Lag

7:00pm Two Plus Two: Ann Streufert & Beth Hoven Rotto + Art Bjorngjeld & Ross Sutter

8:00pm Twin Cities Hardingfelelag

8:30pm ASI Spelmanslag

Saturday, February 21

10:30am – Nordstär Ensemble (Larson Hall)

11:00am – Vasa Junior Dancers (Turnblad Mansion)

12:00pm – The Tamarack Stylites (Larson Hall)

1:00pm – Twin Cities Nyckelharpalag (Turnblad Mansion)

1:30pm – Ponyfolk (Larson Hall)

2:00pm – Twin Cities Hardingfelelag (Turnblad Mansion)

3:00pm – Lynx Lynx (Larson Hall)

10:30am – Youth Fiddle Workshop with Lynx Lynx

12:30pm – Adult Fiddle Workshop with Lynx Lynx

10:15am – Liesl Chatman – “Norwegian Kolrosing”

12:00pm – Beth Hoven Rotto – “Tunes and stories from the Minnesota-Iowa border over the past 50 years“

1:45pm – Kari Tauring – “Mythic Sound: Bones and horns, trees and grass, sounds and stories from the Nordic Root”

10:00am – Jam with Becky Weis Nord

11:15am – Icelandic Tunes with Isaac Muscanto

12:30pm – Tunes from the 1700s-1800s with Renee Vaughan

1:45pm – Accordion Jam with Art Bjorngjeld

10am-4pm – TBD Handcraft Demo on Larson Promenade

10am-4pm – Free Handcraft Make n’ Take Activity on Larson Promenade

Sunday, February 22

10:30am – Tjärnblom (Larson Hall)

11:00am – ASI Lilla Lag (Turnblad Mansion)

12:00pm – The OK Factor (Larson Hall)

12:00pm – ASI Spelmanslag (Turnblad Mansion)

1:30pm – Berätta (Larson Hall)

3:00pm – Skye Consort & Emma Björling (Larson Hall)

10:30am – Vocal Folk Tunes Workshop with Emma Björling (Skye Consort & Emma Björling)

12:30pm – Nyckelharpa Workshop with Simon Alexandre (Skye Consort & Emma Björling)

10:15am – Raquel Dwyer – “Between Hearth and Hedge: Medicinal Plants in the Viking Age”

12:00pm – Tara Austin – “Translating Tradition: American Rosemaling in the Upper Midwest”

1:45pm – Carol Sersland – “Remembering a Dream of Telespringar”

10:00am – Open Nordic Jam with Special Guest TBD

11:15am – Open Nordic Jam with Special Guest TBD

12:30pm – Open Nordic Jam with Special Guest TBD

1:45pm – ASI Cloudberries and ASI Male Chorus Allsong Jam

10am-4pm – TBD Handcraft Demo on Larson Promenade

10am-4pm – Free Handcraft Make N’ Take Activity on Larson Promenade

Vidar Skrede and Patrik Ahlberg join their Scandinavian fiddle forces together in this Norwegian-Swedish folk music duo – Lynx Lynx. The variety of strings includes fiddles, Hardanger fiddles, guitars, and even a mandolin. The mix of tunes is put together by both their original and traditional Nordic fiddle tunes.

This is what music sounds like between two Scandinavian transplants in the Midwest coming together to share their fiddle tunes.

Patrik Ahlberg is a multi-instrumentalist from Sweden. He regularly plays and performs music of both the United States and Sweden.

His current projects include duets of contemporary tunes and arrangements with Nashville fiddler George Jackson, a duo with Norwegian hardanger fiddler Vidar Skrede, and a solo exploration of Swedish fiddle tunes on the classical guitar.

Vidar Skrede is a Nordic folk musician and teacher from Haugesund, Norway, currently living in Milwaukee, WI. He is a performer and a teacher of Harding-fiddle, fiddle, and guitar. He has a background in traditional music from his home area, Rogaland (South West of Norway) and has a master’s degree in performing Nordic folk music at the Royal Academy of Music in Stockholm.

Vidar has numerous bands, projects, and record albums behind him, both in Scandinavia and in America. He has received nominations and awards for his albums in both Norway and Finland. He has toured all the Nordic countries, Scotland, Canada and the United States, and he has performed with a wide range of artists, such as Arja Saijonmaa (FI), Kevin Henderson (UK), Liz Carroll (US), Bruce Molsky (US), Natalie Haas (US), to mention a few artists outside of his own tradition.

Vidar is a leading musician on the Nordic folk music scene and is well known for his own tune creations across the scene; played and recorded by many artists besides himself.

Strings and voice, poetry and story blend together to create Berätta, a new musical project by multi-disciplinary artist, Rose Arrowsmith, with Renee Vaughan on nyckelharpa. Rose grew up as a perpetual wreath-girl at midsommar celebrations, and specializes in the folk stories and songs of Swedish culture and traditions. She has worked in theater as an actor, director, and playwright; and has performed folktales as a traditional oral storyteller since 2001. Rose founded the a capella Swedish folk quartet, SVEA, in 2017, where she began pairing original poetic translations with traditional music.

Renee Vaughan performs in a variety of musical constellations, from intimate duos to larger ensembles, exploring Swedish, Nordic, and Scandinavian-American folk traditions. Her current project, Nordstär Ensemble, brings together exceptional local musicians, carefully chosen to match the spirit and setting of each performance, and reflecting both her Minnesota roots and the Nordic direction of her sound.

Berätta, to tell, invites Midwinter Folk Fest listeners to journey through the dark of winter with the help of candlelight and legends, dancing and dreams of summer days to come.

Ponyfolk was formed in 2014 by Clifton Nesseth (vocals, strings, guitar, synth/keys) and Paul Sauey (vocals, strings, guitar, bass). Based out of Duluth and Minneapolis, MN, the pair’s multi-instrumentalist abilities and vocal harmonies have carved them out a reputation of creating maximalist soundscapes that are defined by droning layers of guitars, strings, and synth textures – undergirding emotionally evocative lyrical imagery. Over the last few years, the band has expanded to include Aaron Hays (drums), Alex Nelson (keyboards), Mikey Marget (cello), and Lewis Franti (percussion). The band will be releasing their debut LP on February 22nd a celebration of traditional Americana and Nordic folk music. Performing in various configurations and styles, Ponyfolk’s music always keeps a foot planted firmly in the ethos of the folk traditions while stepping forward into new sounds and musical terrains.

Whence came this band called Tjärnblom, you may ask? Well, the day after attending an amazing concert by the Swedish band Väsen, Joe Alfano bumped into his work colleague Cheryl Paschke. Joe didn’t know Cheryl well, but he knew that she played fiddle with local Finnish America band Finn Hall, so he stopped at her desk and eagerly went on and on about the incredible Scandinavian music he’d heard the night before, describing, in rapt awe, the details of this strange instrument called a “nyckelharpa.” Cheryl listened patiently. When Joe said, “I wish I could learn how to play the nyckelharpa and that style of music”, Cheryl smiled, then replied, “I have an extra nyckelharpa at home. I’ll bring it to work tomorrow.”

Cheryl and Joe soon took the plunge and began playing Scandinavian music together both as a duo, and with the newly formed American Swedish Institute’s (ASI) affiliated Twin Cities Nyckelharpalag. A few years later, fellow lag member Mary Crimi began to sit in with them. With Mary on nyckelharpa, Joe added octave mandolin and guitar and together the trio expanded their repertoire of traditional Scandinavian tunes. In 2009, after 10 years of informally playing music, Tjärnblom was officially formed. Val Eng was invited to add her swirling range of harmonium sounds to the mix, and then, in 2017 the current band became complete—as Mary bowed out, and multi-instrumentalist, composer, and Twin Cities Nyckelharpalag member Erin Walsh enthusiastically agreed to join in.

Tjärnblom, Swedish for “woodland lake flower” honors Cheryl Paschke’s Swedish grandfather’s family name. The band has released three CDs and has performed across the State of Minnesota at festivals, churches, libraries and community and private celebrations. In 2015 they appeared at a steaming hot July 4th outdoor performance of The Prairie Home Companion. When host Garrison Keillor told them prior to the show that four to five million people would be listening live to the program that day, a look of concern flashed across the band members’ faces. He then added, “Just be sure your instruments are in tune”. Since then, Tjärnblom and their well-tuned instruments have been playing tight arrangements of Swedish, Finnish and original music to audiences both large and small. They are thrilled to be once again a part of 2026 ASI Midwinter Folk Fest.

For more information on our band you can check out our website: http://www.tjarnblom.com You can also look us up on Facebook and Instagram.

Cheryl Paschke grew up playing classical music on violin, later also viola. She started playing Swedish and Finnish folk music as an adult, after attending University of MN fiddling courses. Her first encounter with nyckelharpa was at a spelmansstämma / fiddler’s gathering in Sundsvall, Sweden, where she felt pulled to the sound, as if by a magnet! One of the players saw her intense interest and offered his instrument to try. After asking about the tuning, Cheryl was able to play a simple Swedish song that she knew her mother, who was nearby, would like to hear. And yes, Mom was thrilled, Cheryl was smitten, and interest in a new pursuit began.

Over the decades, nyckelharpa has become Cheryl’s main instrument. She plays a traditional Swedish 3-row nyckelharpa and 4-row nyckelharpa in Tjärnblom, Swedish Trio, Twin Cities Nyckelharpalag, several classical ensembles, and occasionally in orchestras.

Joe Alfano is another baby boomer whose life took a sharp turn when he saw the Beatles play on the Ed Sullivan Show. He spent the next six months shoveling snow and mowing lawns in order to save enough money to buy a guitar. Learning to play it has been a lifelong obsession. Another sharp turn in his life happened when Joe met Cheryl in 1998 and she opened the door to Scandinavian music. Joe plays guitar, three sizes of mandolin, and sometimes even the musical saw in a variety of musical genres with friends around the Twin Cities.

Val Eng began her church music career at age twelve and has been music director for various area churches, most recently for a Hispanic congregation. She loves traditional art forms, is a shape-note singer, and discovered that Nordic music makes her “Norwegian blood boil” by dancing to it. She’s a piano teacher and provided music for area arts camps for many years.

Erin Walsh is a multi-instrumentalist and composer from Buffalo, MN. Though her name is Irish, she is primarily Swedish in ancestry, and enjoys honoring her Swedish-born grandparents (Dalsland and Värmland) through music, playing cello, bass, fiddle, viola, piano, timpani, and näverlur. Her original compositions range from school orchestra pieces to traditionally-styled Swedish and Irish tunes. Erin plays traditional Nordic music around the Twin Cities and greater Minnesota, teaches strings privately in Buffalo, and plays contra music at Tapestry Folkdance Center. She performs with Tjärnblom, ASI Spelmanslag, Twin Cities Nyckelharpalag, and several contra bands.

Art Bjorngjeld and Ross Sutter bring decades of experience between them on accordion, guitar, & voice. Art draws on his Norwegian heritage — his ancestors played for dances all across North Dakota and Minnesota — while Ross’s repertoire carries the soul of church music and community gatherings. Together, they mix old family tunes with new finds from their folk-music adventures.

And now, two more join the mix: Ann Streufert and Beth Hoven Rotto from Decorah, Iowa, long associated with the folk bands Foot-Notes and Maritza, have been twin-fiddling for nearly 40 years — just for the love of it. Their setlist is made for both dancers and listeners, featuring Scandinavian melodies and rediscovered Midwest classics.

When these two duos come together, sparks fly: the warm camaraderie and shared passion will make for an unforgettable evening of traditional music and dance. Expect a celebration — it will be a dance party rooted in tradition, friendship and joy.

The Tamarack Stylites bring to life the traditional music of several different cultures, as well as perform their own original compositions. Their music is infused with the rhythm and groove of diverse American folk sources. Melody and improvisation round out their sound. Learn more about the band and listen to their music on Bandcamp.

Chris Cunningham (guitars) has collaborated on stages and in studios with Marianne Faithfull, The Contortions, John Lurie and the Lounge Lizards, Jeff Buckley, Hal Wilner, Haiti’s Boukman Eksperyans, Turkey’s Omar Farouk, Ireland’s Katell Keineg, Susan McKeown, and Gavin Friday, Anton Fier, John Zorn, Marshall Crenshaw, Joan Osborne, John Medeski, Richie Havens, and many others. He has released two critically acclaimed solo albums, and his recent Twin Cities groups include Superbus Maximus, Creatures of Prometheus, Fall of the House of Usher, Mississippi Peace, Coloring Time, Improvestra, and Improvised Explosive Device, to name just a few. His main repository of recorded musical content is at the-stylites.bandcamp.com and he dutifully serves the people as a professor and confessor of Sound Arts at Minneapolis College.

Cellist and composer Michelle Kinney is most inspired when working in cross-cultural and cross-disciplinary contexts. Recent collaborations with dance include Ananya Dance Theater, Black Label Movement, BRKFST, Laurie Van Wieren; and for theater, Kevin Kling, Michael Sommers, and Theater Latté Da.

Michelle is a regular contributor to the work of some of the Twin Cities’ most interesting musical artists such as Zeitgeist, Mary Ellen Childs, Douglas Ewart, Aby Wolf, Nirmala Rajasekar and Dylan Hicks.

While living in NYC for 13 years, she recorded and performed with creative jazz artists Butch Morris, Henry Threadgill, Brandon Ross and pop artists Sheryl Crow, Natalie Merchant, Lou Reed, to name a few.

Michelle has been recognized for her work by The McKnight Foundation (Composer Fellowship), Two Metropolitan Regional Arts Council Next Step Fund grants, The Bush Foundation (Bush Artists Fellowship), The Jerome Foundation, MN State Arts Board,NEA/Rockefeller, Harvestworks/Studio Pass, and American Composers Forum.

Renegade bassist Nick Gaudette is a seasoned performer, educator, creator, and arts collaborator. His unique individualized sound is rooted in the classical conservatory training but also embraces jazz, rock, folk, tango, and contemporary new sounds for the upright bass. Nick is a founding member and bassist with the Orange Mighty Trio (hybrid chamber-fiddle music), the Cherry Spoon Collective (multi-generational group of composer/ musicians) and is a frequent collaborator / composer for modern dance. During the school year, Nick directs the advanced orchestras at Edina High School and is an active member in the field of music education. Nick is a Minnesota State Arts Board Artist Initiative recipient, a Cedar Commission Artist, an EdFund grant recipient, outdoors person, motorcyclist, and dad.

Joe Strachan, a versatile pianist based in Saint Paul, brings a decade of musical prowess to national and international stages. Joe’s dynamic career includes accompanying dance, performing on synths and electronics, and composing for a diverse range of collaborations in dance and theater. Recent work includes touring with Craig Finn, and Mixed Blood Theater, as well as performing locally with ThoughtCast, Little Boat, the Interstellar Cowboy band, Wheel Eternal, HatchDance and Superbus Maximus. Joe’s work has been recognized with awards such as the Next Step Fund (2020).

Renee Vaughan performs in a variety of musical constellations, from intimate duos to larger ensembles, exploring Swedish, Nordic, and Scandinavian-American folk traditions. Her current project, Nordstär Ensemble, brings together exceptional local musicians, carefully chosen to match the spirit and setting of each performance. The name Nordstär reflects both our Minnesota roots and the Nordic direction of our sound.

At this year’s Midwinter Folk Festival, Renee is joined by Paul Sauey (guitar), Laura MacKenzie (säckpipa and wood flutes), and Sarah Pradt (fiddle) to present a selection of Sweden’s hottest hits from the 18th century. Ever wonder what tunes were played by a transgender nyckelharpist in a Stockholm tavern in 1702? Or what music filled the barn dances hosted by botanist and noted polska dancer Carl Linnaeus? How did the polonaise evolve as it traveled from the refined royal courts into the lively village dances of everyday people? And how do these tunes sound today with modern aesthetics and Nordic guitar?

The ASI Spelmanslag is the fiddling group of the American Swedish Institute. This ensemble, founded by NEA Heritage fellow, Paul Dahlin, plays the traditional folk music of Sweden, primarily from the region of Dalarna. The group’s repertoire includes traditional dance tunes such as waltzes, schottisches, and polskas. Frances Olson leads the adult ensemble while Ingela Haaland lead’s the youth ensemble known as the ASI Lilla Lag.

The Twin Cities Hardinfelelag was founded in the 1990s by the master fiddler Olav Jørgen Hegge of Valdres, Norway. He was regarded by many as the leading tradition-bearer of the Hardanger fiddle and the dance style from the Valdres valley. He played and danced for more than 40 years. He had many fiddle students on both sides of the Atlantic. Two of his best-known students, Tore Bolstad and Jan Beitohaugen Granli, have both won the Landskappleiken, the Norwegian national hardanger fiddle competition that has been taking place since 1896. Olav himself didn’t play in competitions but often served as a judge. He was a sought-after dance fiddler, and was featured on Norwegian radio and television. With his wife, Mary, of St. Paul, Minnesota, Olav taught dance of the Valdres region at numerous workshops in the United States, Sweden, and Norway.

Olav Jørgen Hegge’s untimely death in August 2005 strengthened our resolve to continue the Hardanger fiddle tradition he so lovingly taught. After his death, in June 2006 the group carried out Olav’s request that we travel to Beitostølen, Norway. In Olav’s beloved Valdres, the Twin Cities Hardingfelelag became the first U.S.-based hardanger fiddle group to compete in the annual Landskappleiken, the national fiddling and dance competition.

In addition to learning from Olav Jørgen Hegge, members of the group have traveled to Norway to hear and learn music of other Norwegian traditions. Some of us studied with Dr. Andrea Een at St. Olaf College, the first faculty member in the U.S. to bring hardanger fiddle to an academic institution’s music curriculum. Over the years, all of us have studied with Loretta Kelley and the many other wonderful players and teachers who travel within or come to the U.S. as part of the Hardanger Fiddle Association of America’s annual workshops and the Nisswa-stämman music festival.

The Twin Cities Nyckelharpalag (Key Fiddle Group) was formed in 1998 to practice and perform Swedish folk music. Their repertoire is drawn mostly from folk tunes in Uppland, Sweden, where the nyckelharpa tradition has its roots. Whether leading a procession, playing for dancing, performing in concert or providing focus for special events, the TC Nyckelharpalag enthusiastically carries on Swedish traditions through music. In performance members of the group wear folk-dräkt, folk costumes modeled after clothing worn on special occasions in the 19th century.

The ASI Cloudberries Women’s Choir brings people together to share the music, culture, and language of Sweden with audiences everywhere. The ensemble’s mission is to perform authentic Swedish music for audiences who are interested in ethnic music, and to entertain the Swedish American community. They perform both a cappella and are accompanied by guitar, accordion, fiddle, clarinet, piano and bodhran . Their repertoire ranges from Swedish folk tunes to sacred hymns and contemporary music. Since 2004, the ASI Cloudberries have performed in Minnesota, Illinois, and Oregon. The ASI Cloudberries are members of the American Union of Swedish Singers-AUSS. 

The Vasa Junior Dancers learn a variety of Swedish folk dances, songs, and cultural customs. The folk dancers are sponsored by the four Vasa Lodges in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area.

The group performs year-round. Dancers can be found leading dances around the majstång (maypole) at the American Swedish Institute’s midsommar. The group also performs at Scandinavian summer festivals and at traditional Swedish Saint Lucia celebrations in December.

As a folk artist, teacher, and amateur folklorist, Liesl Chatman is on a mission to bring back the accessible and enjoyable traditional decorative folk art of kolrosing (similar to scrimshaw, think of kolrosing as tattooing wood).  She is an accomplished spoon carver, and her kolrosed spoons have been exhibited at museums including a one-woman show of 35 illustrated story spoons at the American Swedish Institute.  Kolrosing is an endangered craft—it is officially “red-listed” in Norway—and so Liesl travels to Sweden and Norway to both teach kolrosing and to explore its lore dating back to Viking times.  A passionate teacher, she has won numerous awards over the course of her 35-year career in education.  She was the 2023 Folk Artist-in-Residence at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and a 2024 American Scandinavian Foundation (ASF) Fellow. In the US, she teaches at the American Swedish Institute, John C. Campbell Folk School, North House Folk School, and the Vesterheim Norwegian American Museum. In Scandinavia, she teaches at Sätergläntan, Rauland Akademiet,  and the Gudbrandals Museum. In the fall of 2026, Liesl and renowned Swedish craftsman Jögge Sundqvist will undertake an ASF-funded road trip down the spine of Norway to continue to gather the fast disappearing lore of kolrosing.

Follow her @rivchicawarrior on Instagram. 

Carol Sersland is a tradition bearer of dance and song from Telemark, Norway. She started dancing with her father as a young girl. Her father, Harold K. Sersland, was a life-long folk dancer who immigrated from Telemark.  Carol grew up in an environment where Hardanger fiddle music and Telespringar were a common part of the family’s social activities. Their first performance of Telespringar was at Vesterheim’s Nordic Fest in Iowa in 1968 with the Hardanger fiddler Anund Roheim playing.  Carol and her father were invited to perform at the Smithsonian’s Folk Life Festival in 1974 and 1976.  Carol studied and skied at Rauland Akademiet Folk High School. In 2023, after receiving a Fellowship from the American Scandinavian Foundation to study folk dance groups in Norway, Carol brought the dance “back” to Norway when she danced with her cousin, Jon Inge Særsland, in Landskappleiken, the national folk dance and music contest. She continues to share this legacy through performances, teaching, and the HK Sersland Scholarship for Young Dancers through the Hardanger Fiddle Association of America.  HK Sersland is a Norwegian immigrant who carried the dance tradition from the old country to the new and is worthy of recognition for his perseverance and leadership in continuing Norwegian culture in America. Carol will speak about this in her presentation “A Dream of Telespringar in America”.

Kari Tauring is a full time cultural artist and educator touring throughout the Midwest and Scandinavia. She plays Nature Instruments and carries stories, songs, and dances of Norse culture and heritage to audiences of all ages and cultures. Growing up in Minnesota with summers on the family farm in Wisconsin, love and connection with her Norwegian heritage is a source of strength and inspiration. Interest in the deep root culture began in 1988 exploring Norse runes and poetry as an undergraduate student, a time she called “peeking under the lefse.” Moving up the root from the most ancient poems into the immigrant era of her grandparents has been her life’s joy.

In frequent travels to Norway, Tauring learns from and performs with relatives and friends. She studied and made Iron Age bone and tree flutes with masters in Denmark and Norway on a Viking Connection Apprenticeship in 2023.

Tauring teaches runes, primstav, and folklore at Norway House MN, and Norwegian folk dancing at Tapestry Folkdance Center. She co-leads the Twin Cities Nordic Dance group and works with Carol Sersland to teach Norwegian dance from North Dakota to North Carolina. Her presentations are filled with humor and a balance of scholarship and lived experience.

Tauring has four Nordic roots musical recordings, four books on runes, Old Norse spirituality, and poetry, and a variety of videos all available on her website: KariTauring.com

Raquel A. Dwyer, PhD is an archaeologist, paleoethnobotanist, and storyteller who listens for the quiet knowledge carried in roots, leaves, and old ground. Her work explores how people of the Viking Age and medieval North understood healing—not as abstract theory, but as something practiced at the hearth, in the field, and along forest paths. She earned her PhD from the University at Buffalo in 2025, developing new ways to recognize medicinal plant use in the archaeological record, a body of work she calls paleoethnomedicine. She is a former recipient of the Lilly Lorénzen Scholarship, supporting her research into Scandinavian history and traditional knowledge.

Raquel currently serves as Executive Director of the Edina Historical Society, where she brings archaeology into conversation with community memory through public programs, lectures, and hands-on interpretation. Her work weaves together plants, landscapes, folklore, and material traces of everyday life, inviting audiences to consider how healing knowledge was learned, shared, and remembered long before it was written down. Through her talks, she offers a way of seeing the past not as distant or lost, but as something still rooted beneath our feet.